


Haunting of the Henbane

by Narcis_The_Monk



Category: Far Cry (Video Games), Far Cry 5
Genre: Alternate Universe, Demons, Horror, M/M, supernatural happenings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-07-13 12:29:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 11
Words: 55,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16017947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Narcis_The_Monk/pseuds/Narcis_The_Monk
Summary: If you’d asked Sharky Boshaw what he was planning to do on a boring autumn Saturday night in the middle of Hope County, Montana, he wouldn’t have even considered this. That’d he’d be rowing out on the river in a tiny “borrowed” boat with his world wise cousin to that old abandoned Church. The one that still lingered on that island in the middle of the Henbane. And yet...here he was.





	1. Spilling Midnight on Their Altars

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AnnieMabelCoffeeTable](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnnieMabelCoffeeTable/gifts), [My_Dear_Watson](https://archiveofourown.org/users/My_Dear_Watson/gifts), [Assie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Assie/gifts).



> Dedicated to the lovely people that are always so very kind to me about my work. I hope y'all like this as much I do. ^^;;

If you’d asked Sharky Boshaw what he was planning to do on a boring autumn Saturday night in the middle of Hope County, Montana, he wouldn’t have even considered this. That’d he’d be rowing out on the river in a tiny “borrowed” boat with his world wise cousin to that old abandoned Church. The one that still lingered on that island in the middle of the Henbane. And he definitely wouldn’t have expected that between them in the boat would be a large bag of supplies for some kind of weird ritual he somehow wasn’t shocked Hurk knew how to do in the slightest. 

But the goosebumps starting to prickle on his skin the closer they got to their target screamed to him that this was a _bad idea._ The fog that skirted over the water on these cool nights was thickest around the shore, but it was like the moment the boat got next to that dilapidated dock its grasp broke free and the world was clear again. That did not make him feel better. Instead the realization ate at his nerves steadily as he secured the boat to the most stable section of the dock until he could see a can floating in his peripheral. He jumped as he turned to it, and Hurk laughed loudly at him before he took the offered beer to chug it.

“You’re all kinds of jumpy, Sharky. You scared of the dark?” Hurk’s words were only meant as a friendly nudge in the side, but they threw him into a defensive stance none the less. He huffed up, feeling his chest swell with an unearned confidence as he shook his head.

“No fuck that. It’s just…it’s nothing. Come on and get your shit.” Sharky bit the words out, as he climbed out of the boat before the other had a chance to toss the bag between them at him. He almost fell off the other side of the dock, but he caught it and hurried off the wooden platform that felt like it was swaying under his feet. He dug through the bag to find a flashlight before he turned it on and headed up the sloping path. It’d clearly seen better days, and that thought was confirmed when halfway there the trail gave way to what once might have been a clear stone path that was now filled in by crawling vines and spreading weeds. Every step he made before the stone had started had echoed back to him, bouncing off the barrier of fog that protected the island, but now his every sound felt swallowed by a void of darkness. He could feel the chill of the night seeping into his bones despite his hoodie and the long sleeve shirt beneath it. “Something ain’t right…”

“Well no shit, Sharky. This whole damn island is haunted all to Hell. You know the stories, just like I do. That’s why this place is so perfect!” Hurk’s voice splitting the night once more had him clutching at his chest then huffing again before shining his beam around the land surrounding them. As they closed in on the looming Church, its doors drifted open with the breeze, clanging against the walls hard enough to shake them on their hinges. The clouds above them broke apart for the full moon to shine down on the area and it lit up almost blindingly bright.

The building itself sat on top of the small hill, the ground to the left of it barren and he could see a circle still burnt into the ground from ages ago. It brought his mind to those stories his cousin had mentioned. Years ago, before the concept of his being had even been considered, this entire island had been owned by a single family that had been under the control of a the worst kind of cult. No one who ever joined ever left, and there had been stories of hearing the screaming of their sacrifices echoing across the river and pyres large enough they could be seen from either side of the river. Then one day , it was just like everyone who’d ever been here was just swallowed up by the ground itself. The sudden silence surrounding the land brought curious people out to check it out, and they’d never found a single body or even a sign that life had ever been here before beyond the abandoned buildings and the remaining relics left behind. Some superstitious fool made it a law to never return to the cursed place, but over time that unspoken rule was lost to stupid teenage rights of passage or drunken dares. Sharky himself had avoided it successfully for most of his existence. _‘And yet here I fuckin am…on a drunken dare. Goddamn, I really need to start thinking my life choices through more. Is peer pressure really worth possibly dying?’_

While he was fretting silently in his head, Hurk moved passed him with zero fear and he wasn’t sure if he was envious of him for being brave or if that green spark sprung from the fact that the other was too oblivious to be afraid. It was probably both, if he was being honest, and it made him grin despite himself as he found a new reason to look up to the other. He followed after, trying to push the resonating voice inside himself back. _‘He’s not scared, I shouldn’t be scared.’_

Once they passed through the open doors though, they slammed shut behind them and he immediately felt that panic creeping up him again as Hurk just laughed it off. He dropped the bag to the ground to find another beer to down to calm his nerves again. He let Hurk take over the bag as he didn’t know how to do that, and the other was giving no instructions as he moved everything to the altar lit up by the moonlight through the broken window behind it. He decided to begin looking around the large open space out of some morbid curiousity and a desperate urge to prove that superstitions were in fact bogus.

He abandoned the path to the altar for weaving through the pews that hadn’t been tipped over. Everything looked like it was coated in a layer of dust that seemed to dull the room, but when he stopped to trace a finger along the back of one of the still intact wooden pews, he learned that it wasn’t dust muddling everything up—it was ash, and it was fresh. It had to be, otherwise it would be caked on like a thick shell. It was surprisingly dry in here too, because the fog should have provided enough humidity for it to dampen everything. He pushed that realization away quickly, finding no comfort in it either. _‘Its like they just burnt someone up and left them here.’_

Abandoning the pews and their mystery ash, he moved towards the closest wall. Long forgotten tapestries hung from rusty nails by what looked like a mix of spider silk, some really tough threads, and a whole lot of hope. They had that same layer of ash, and a strong smell of musk from the ages clung to them that made him cough as they swayed. Their movements made him squirm, but he did his best to convince himself that it was him moving past them that had them swinging in time to the echoing creak of floor boards around the room. Between them was what was once a rather large book shelf. Some of the shelves were tilted, the bare contents of them collected into the lowest corner of each. 

As he passed the beam of light over the shelves, he poked around through them when his light passed over something that caught the light. He moved closer, the rest of the room almost falling away as he leaned over the shelf that was just lower than eye level for him. Bringing the light closer, he tried to find what caught his eye when its giveaway shine flashed its beacon for him again. His eyes fell on a small iron ring. He frowned a bit at that—iron shouldn’t shine like that when it’s that old. It shouldn’t shine like that at all. He reached for it, picking it up to look at it.

The metal felt warm under his fingers, a stark contrast to the rest of the room, but he moved it closer to the light to look at it. It felt heavy in his hand, and it was fairly wide. He could see the outside edges showed its imperfections, and he tilted it to see if there was an engraving. He twisted it around until he found words, and he was squinting hard to try and read them through the shifting haze of his vision as the drunk fully kicked in. “Babist..baptits…baptista…baptistae?” The whispered attempts felt like they were tangible, woven in clear lines as the various attempts finally lined up and clicked into place. Suddenly breathing felt like swallowing thick darkness as silence surrounded him. The metal in his fingers flashed hot and he dropped the offending object, hissing as he pulled his fingers against his mouth to suck at the burn instinctively. He looked around his feet for it, but when he looked up he found it back on the shelf. “What the…fuck?” He asked that before questioning why he was reaching for it again. This time when he picked it up, he felt that same burn but he clenched his fist around it regardless. _‘What the fuck am I doing? More importantly why can’t I stop?’_

The ring went cold in his hand now, and when he opened it he found some sort of spiral burned into his palm. Before he had time to marvel at it, he felt some sort of whisper against his brain like a impulsive thought— _‘The key…find the key…’_ —that wasn’t his own, but he was turning to the head of the room. Hurk had candles set up everywhere and lit the room in a quivering light, symbols drawn on the ground in lazy spirals of chalk that felt strangely familiar. Salt had been scattered around in a circle, but he walked past that to the podium just beyond it where the image of a book was settled into his mind. Picking up the withering book felt natural, and he let it fall open in front of him. Hidden in a small slot made in the pages was an old, heavy key on a fading and flaking cord. He picked it up and wound it about his opposite wrist, barely securing it when a harsh grip to his arm jerked him out of what trance had him in its throes and the sounds of the outside world slammed into him.

He could see Hurk talk, his mouth was mouthing, but his words were drowned out by the sound of wind curling around the building and the whining of the old wooden building. Hurk words were thunderous when they finally registered and he jerked away quickly. “—the shit, man? You finding all the goodies while I’m doing all the work! Whatever, I’m almost done. Come on.” He was clutching at his head, but he nodded along. Right, the reason they were here. 

The world once again clicked into place as he moved to where the other had pointed. He looked down at the metal dishes, the four small vessels filled with a pungent liquid that was thicker than water. He touched the surface of it, pulling his fingers away to rub them together to find the film making his fingers slip. “Oil?” He glanced up at Hurk, before casting his gaze around them at all the possible tinder that surrounded them. “In this dusty old fart of a powder keg, with this many lit candles? Are you asking for a fire?”

Hurk looked at him, almost offended as he crossed his arms and leaned back as he lifted his brows up in surprise. “Hey now, if you know the right way to summon things then by all means correct me—but you don’t right?” The question was genuine though, no anger or sarcasm as he leaned forward again inquisitively holding out the scroll in question.

He waved him back, and he quickly found shaking his head was a mistake as it seemed to make everything fuzzier. “No. Everything looks like scribbles right now anyway. My head feels fuzzy, like the beers really settling in now.” He picked up to of the dishes before being told where to place them, and he followed the instructions quickly. He just wanted to get this over with and go home, because some weird shit was going on around them and he was paranoid while his company didn’t seem to notice it. Was it all in his own head? He needed to distract himself again. “Where did you even get all this shit?”

“I got my sources, Sharky, don’t you be questioning me now.” Hurk argued, and he gave a dry laugh in response. He knelt down to settle the shallow bowl down on one side, being able to lean over and place the other one easily in the same motion. He felt his hand pulse as he pulled away again, finding an odd source of comfort at the edge of the circle closer to the outside of the salt ring. 

He forced himself to reply and found that fact just as disconcerting as everything else had been so far. “Ain’t calling you out, just trying to fill the silence around us. Cause if you haven’t noticed, there’s a whole lot of that right now and I am not the biggest fan of that element.” 

“Yeah, well, we’re ready. So no more silence. Time to get this party started for real.” The reply almost punched him, and he felt that twitchy feeling of flight fidgeting with his limbs as he found his voice suddenly and loudly.

“This is a bad idea, Hurk.” His voice cracked, and he flinched back at the sound of. When the other stood in front of him, he could have sworn he heard that voice at the edge of his conscience, whispering in his ear and dancing down his nerves once more as his heart beat picked up with each repeated phrase. _‘Say my name…my name…say it…’_ It sounded louder, like it was closer than it was before, and he found himself shivering with some twisted sort of anticipation. The room felt suddenly smaller, and he fond himself pulling his guard up higher as he folded in on himself.

“Well now, Sharky, its just too late. We already came this far. You really think anything is gonna happen?” The teasing again, though this voice was real. He looked across at his cousin, who held the scroll close to his face as he squinted trying to read it. Something about the sway of the other had him nervous all over again and he twisted around to look at the room as all the light beyond their candles seemed to drain out of it to leave them in an unnatural darkness. But he swallowed the lump in his throat, and shook his head. He was _not happy_ with this, but he wasn’t about to leave his family behind and run for it. He was not a coward.

“I don’t fucking know, maybe? But fine. Its probably gonna be nothing, I’m just working myself up over nothing again.” He focused on the words, forcing belief into them to overpower the inky darkness and the dread under his skin. It was hard, but he could see the glimmer of ignorance at the edges of his eyes. “You know me…mountains out of molehills and all that bullshit.” He blinked, but the moonlit room only came in fleeting flashes he wished would linger longer.

He chose to close his eyes when he finally heard the other start reading, and Hurk’s voice rose and fell in intensity as he struggled through words Sharky had no hope of understanding or even repeating as the sound of howling wind started up again outside the shaking Church, and if he listened closely he could hear screaming mingling throughout the storm as the doors slammed open and shut. Soon the scent of smoke filled the room and when he let his eyes fall open he could see the burning dots of embers twisting around them. There was a brief moment where that fascination of his took over, and he found the swirling flecks of red hot and golden light breathtaking. 

He felt a fuzzy touch against his arms as he lifted his hands towards the lights, caught up in whatever power this place had. He felt himself being guided into holding both his hands up, palms forward like the pastor of that church he’d been dragged to as a child, as the other sputtered to a stop. He heard that voice again— _‘My name!’_ —and he was speaking before he could stop himself, or even comprehend what he was saying. “Baptistae.” The moment the word left his lips, he could feel that searing pain in his hand again like he was clasping onto a hot coal. What surprised him was the burning around his right wrist, where the cord of the key suddenly tightened around his skin and burned another swirl into his skin. 

Lightning crackled around them loudly, booming as if it was striking the very shore of the island. The quaking of the ground beneath them adding to the feeling of the world falling down around them. He tumbled backwards, and he felt tangible fingers clutching at his shoulders and he jerked forward and away from them. He yelped then, and manic laughter filled the room now. He turned to look at his cousin, and the other stood with his jaw dropped and his eyes wide. Were they seeing the same thing? _‘What the fuck is this bullshit? Nothing was supposed to happen! This shit’s not real, right?’_ He let himself scream as the cacophony of chaos around them rose to a fever pitch, before he felt the energy itself blast out across the sweeping landscape in a screaming blur of smoke with the echoing cries of agony woven tightly through it carried with it.

He spun around, watching that endless void of existence around them for any kind of sign of something lurking. Suddenly he could see the silhouette of a person with a cane, a wicked white grin splitting the shadow’s presumed face as it lifted it’s hand to snap its fingers. The doors flew open again, slamming so roughly against the walls he could hear the wood splintering, and the wind rushed through them and then again over them. The candles around them intensified suddenly, the flames burning far higher than they should be able to before blowing out completely without warning. He kept his eyes on that figure, and the moment the candles were blown out he could see something a lot more real there before it vanished into a spiral of smoke.

_‘Soon.’_ The voiced echoed throughout his bones now, and he turned to look at his cousin with desperate eyes. “We need to go, we need to go now.” He whispered, and the other didn’t even hesitate in bolting for the doors behind him. He turned and followed quickly on his heels, knocking over the dishes and scattering the salt. Sharky could hear his heart pounding, but when he glanced behind him and saw a room full of shadow monsters closing in on them he swore he could feel his heart leave his chest. The candles flickered back to life and the creatures hissed as the light touched them, and some sort of twisting serpent of a shade knocked the source of the attack over and the fire caught the oil. He could feel the building moan and he knew there was no way this thing wasn’t about to go up in a burning ball of misery.

“Get to the boat!” He shouted, catching up to Hurk and grabbing him by the wrist to hurry him up quicker. The heat at his back let him know how far the fire had climbed, and he was just glad there’d probably be no immediate rush to investigate who burned down the old church no one was supposed to go near out of common sense. He was so preoccupied in the need to get out, to leave, to be safe that he didn’t even notice the fog that surrounded the island before was completely gone or that the fire didn’t reflect in the water until they were back in the truck and racing away from what they’d done. No, those facts didn’t settle into his memory until they were pulling up in front of the trailer park he had all to himself. He didn’t even realize it until he’d sent Hurk off to the tiny guest room of his trailer, and he found himself at his tiny dining table with a bottle of whiskey.

The throbbing of his new burns suddenly flashed through everything and he hissed lowly as he looked at them now. The spiral that twisted out from the center of his left palm had significantly increased in size since he’d last looked at it. He turned his attention away to his right wrist, where the cord had seared another sort of twisting spiral around his arm and down his hand. He stood to find the tiny first aid kit he kept around, before finding getting the key free from his wrist was more of a hassle than it should have been. He found he couldn’t set it down once it was off of him so he settled with tying it around his neck to appease whatever attachment he suddenly had to that item. He cleaned the wounds, wrapping them in gauze as well as he could. 

He was quick to find that whiskey again, downing quite a bit before he stopped to breathe. He realized he should get some kind of food into him, before his stomach twisted at the thought and he was at the toilet heaving. He wasn’t sure if it was the alcohol, the events of the evening, or the combination of both. He thought he heard footsteps at one point as he was bent over the toilet in the little bathroom and he hoped he wasn’t bothering his cousin. He stumbled to his own bedroom, leaning heavily against walls as he made his way there slowly. He got through the door, stripping himself down to cool off from the sudden fever that was crawling over his body.

He fell heavy into his bed, his body suddenly heavy under his own weight. He crawled under his blankets, and away from the dark corners of his room out of a lingering fear. As his eyes started to fall shut, he registered heavy breathing beside him on the bed. He turned his face towards it, but didn’t pull back the blankets as his breathing caught in his chest and a strangled sound escaped his throat. A soft laughter filled the room and replaced that infernal panting in his ear and he wasn’t sure if that was any better. It sounded like it came from deep in someone’s chest, and for some reason there was a moment of reassurance that swept over him and a shiver ran down his spine. 

He felt hands on his back now, pressing him into the mattress lightly. He could feel the breath being pushed from him, but something told him he was being tested—that it wasn’t hurting him. There could have been claws and bloodshed, but instead there was teasing and the smell of burning paper always at the edges of his senses. He closed his eyes again, focusing on trying to just rest. The pressure on him released and he took a deep breath, the soot in the air burning the back of his throat lightly. There was silence before its next move.

The foot of the bed shifted as if someone sat down by his feet, and he couldn’t stop himself from pulling his feet away just a bit. But there was nothing else, no more sounds, no more smells—nothing. He felt grateful as he closed his eyes and finally succumbed to sleep. He drifted happily into that space between worlds, and he could hear a low humming sounding through the darkness. The crisp moment of peace was not rewarding enough as it gave way to terrors quickly. 

He found himself falling into that darkness again, always that darkness—but when he was expecting to find fire he found himself drowning in the crushing weight of water. He felt like something was tied around his neck, pulling him down into the depths—far deeper than he could ever imagine. The suffocating solitude of it was a far worse torment than the burning of his lungs as he took in breath after breath of water, his body telling him to breathe even though he couldn’t even see the surface anymore. _Could he ever see the surface?_

He reached out, flailed about for anything to save himself when he felt claws digging into his arms and yanking him from the jaws of his own death speeding towards him in a blinding light. He could feel himself bleeding, feel it trickling down his arms more as those saving talons ripped deeper into his flesh. He hissed sharply, but the claws didn’t release him until he was out of that velvet embrace of cold. He could feel heat against his arms, the pain giving way to blistering warmth that flooded his veins and had him screaming as he clawed at his arms. His voice echoed back at him, accompanied with soft whispering he couldn’t understand. 

He curled in on himself, a dying flame of desperation as he felt his tears dripping from his eyes. They evaporated off his skin in little wisps, and for a moment he felt like he was complete. Like he’d been missing something, and he found it, even if he didn’t know what it was. When he sat himself up, he saw the world around him—his home, in flames and the resonating screams of agony made his heart hurt. And for a moment, he was certain of something. _“This is the future…I did this…what the fuck did I do?”_

He felt breath at his lips and he inhaled deeply, oxygen filling him up and stoking his flame back to life as he forced himself up and away from the welcoming tendrils of the somber land that had been trying to consume. _“That’s it, fight it…”_ The voice from before, the one that gave him that foreboding promise of _‘Soon’_ earlier was whispering encouragement and he lapped at it greedily as he moved forward to the vision of his world in flames. He could feel strength flooding him as he reached smoking fingers out to touch the warping image before him. His fingers hovered over the wobbling screen before him, and at his touch he could feel peace spreading from. He spoke now, nodding his head solemnly before he made his promise. “I’ll fix this. Whatever it takes, I’ll fix this.”

A deep sigh echoed around him, that faint voice of promise now echoing around him as if it was coming from every angle at once. “Now you’ve gone and done it, haven’t you?” It sounded so disappointed, as if it had expected him to make a rash decision. Wasn’t that what he had done tonight, just a few seconds ago here—wherever they were?

“Done what?” He asked dumbly, and he realized how ignorant that sounded. He could hear the screaming echoing from the vision still in front of him, and when he pulled back and clenched his fists back at his side he felt his skin cracking open to reveal that molten fire he felt flowing thick through his veins.

Laughter came now, with a note of amusement singing through its following words. “Signed your contract. Your stupidity shall be undone.” He was blessed with that reassuring feeling, comfort settling into his bones as he embraced who he had become on this journey. Once more, that voice flooded over his skin, and it felt so cool against his feverish skin. “But it is not going to be easy by any means. Rest now Charlemagne, tomorrow is going to be a long one.”

It didn’t bother him that the voice knew his name, it just made sense at this point. He sighed now himself, nodding along to nothing. “I know…” He admitted, as he considered the entire evening and now this very vivid—dream? Hallucination? _‘Fuck if I know the difference.’_ He shrugged at the thought.

Laughter greeted him once more and he found himself grinning along with it all while some sense of dread still tugged at him from the corners of his subconscious. “Oh do you now?” The voice rubbed at his aching muscles, soothed his singed soul and skin with soft tones. “I promise you…you have no idea what’s in store for you. Now…go back to sleep.” He felt himself being pushed back, and he fell back into his pillows and blankets once more in his body. He breathed deeply as he fell into a deep enough sleep that nothing could pull him from it short of another fire. 

It was an oddly refreshing, dream-free sleep that left his tired bones feeling younger and his aching joints free of any kind of pain despite the rain he could hear against the window at the head of his bed. He stirred softly before turning back over under his blankets and snuggling back down into the mattress. Groaning softly, he let his eyes open and he blinked the grey world back into existence. He had almost forgotten the events from the night before, when a voice broke the beautiful morning silence.

“Are you going to lie there all day, or shall you be a proper host for once?” He blinked, trying to match the voices to the ones he had memorized but it didn’t click into any of those slots. The voice sounded…proper, but with a bit of grit behind it that came with either smoking a lot or charred lungs—just enough of a rasp to register, but not enough to hinder. It whined again, and he winced a bit at the sudden ache in his head. “I’ve been here for an entire night, and you’ve yet to offer me a single thing. Do you have any the most basic of manners?”

“Alright, who the fuck—” Sharky started as he sat up, but the shock of what he was greeted with froze him mid sentence. 

The voice finally clicked into place—the voice that ghosted over the edges of his nerves before. “What’s with the face? I’d almost think you’d never seen a demon before, but I know you saw me last night.”


	2. The Devil's in the Details

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sharky finds out just what he managed to do the night before.

Leaning against his door was the creature who’s silhouette he’d seen the night before in that dark void that haunted his thoughts. The creature in question was humanoid like he’d expected, and he was tossing an elaborately carved cane from hand to hand. Sharky’s eyes jumped around the other, taking in different notes about him in random spurts. 

Ashen grey skin flecked with glimmering gold that looked like paper being eaten away by fire caught his eyes first—their edges only ever shifted, never growing in size, and smoke curled up from them into the air. He had thin, elegant horns that started shortly after his full hairline and they arced back over his slicked back dark brown hair neatly. He wore a tidy, deep blue shirt with his sleeves rolled up to expose the burning skin of his arms and the ink etched beneath it. That was topped with a black vest, and he could see a few chains hanging from it glittering in the soft glow he was producing around him. His eyes fell to the open neck of the shirt, where he could see part of a word carved into his chest. His arms bore more of those strange symbols, words written like the engraving in the ring still on his finger, and more of those odd spirals like the one on his palm beneath the gauze. 

He focused on his hands last, elegant long fingers each tipped in manicured black claws. His fingers looked like they were stained permanently with ink, a stark contrast against the paper texture of his skin. The staining stopped just past his knuckles, trailing off and blending into the rest of the grey below right where his tattoos began. One hand bore a star ringed in diamonds, and he realized his hands had stilled long enough for him to make out those details. His eyes lifted up now, and he found them face to face in a matter of an eye blink. He took the moment to take in as many details of his face as he could. 

The first thing he noticed was the bright blue eyes that flickered like the hottest part of a burning candle through almost frosted glass framed by thick eyelashes and that same inky staining of his fingers. The image of an upside down crescent moon rested on his brow above a striking nose. The demon, as he claimed to be, was smirking back at him and he’d be damned if his perfectly trimmed beard didn’t frame it perfectly. A movement to his right had him breaking eye contact, before he realized that was the tip of a tail that curled back around the creature. For some reason that was what sunk it home and he scrambled back on his bed away, and the creature—man?—leaned back away from him to laugh loudly and deeply.

“Did you get a good enough look? Have you quelled some quandary in your soul there? That’s good, great even. It means we can move on. And while I do appreciate being admired for so long, we have more important matters to discuss.” He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, but it hadn’t been the smooth voice that spoke to him—there was less hint of a rasp when it was in person. He blinked as the demon had moved into a sweeping bow before he stood up straight and lifted his cane to point the large orb at the end towards him accusingly. “Are you fully aware of just what you did last night?” The tone caught his voice in his throat, the sound of disappointment and blame that was laced through it making him flinch through his panic as everything really set in. _‘There’s a demon in my room.’_

“Oh fuck…you’re…well fuck me.” Sharky’s words were stalling like an overworked engine as his brain tried to catch up to this new information. _‘That’s a fucking demon, and its right there.’_

More laughter, before the demon’s brow furrowed up again. “I’d like to decline on the fact that I am fairly angry with you right now.” This wasn’t real, there was no way this was real. He wasn’t sure if he would rather be hallucinating right now, but he stood up to retreat to the living room. He walked right passed the creature, ignoring the heat emanating from him as he kept his path straight towards the kitchen. 

Nervous laughter bubbled from his lips, little giggles that fell in pops as he shook his head. “Nope! Nope, no--not today.” 

The unnamed unworldly being followed him hot on his heels, literally fuming as flames licked at his skin now where those flecks only smoldered before. “Did you just dismiss me? And with a ‘nope’?” His tone was indignant, clearly offended and angry. _‘Hot headed.’_ He sent himself into another fit of laughter and the other huffed again as they settled into place where he was rooting through the fridge to find something to eat. “Who do you think you are?”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I was under the impression that you already knew who the fuck I was!” Sharky snapped back, turning briefly to glare at him in his own sort of rage. “That’s why you told me what to do, that’s why you moved my fucking arms, that’s why you were in my dreams!”

He watched a smile curl over the creature’s lips, flashing sharp fangs along both rows of teeth. “Oh, clever one aren’t you?” He cocked a hip out as he leaned on that cane, and that lashing tail was now twitching in an agitated way.

“Glad you’re impressed, because I just may be tripping the fuck out right now.” Then he was back to dismissing him to sigh before he settled on making a sandwich because it’d be easier and his head really did still hurt. _‘Speakin’ of…’_ After everything had been pulled out and dropped on the counter, he went for a bottle of water and began the hunt for the painkillers. Then he heard that voice again, smooth and smoky against his senses.

“Oh but you’re not. I am very much here, very much in front of you, and very much pissed you managed to summon me _after_ you’d erased the wards tying me to that damnable island! Now I’m stuck here following you around by this unseen tether until _we_ correct the havoc _you_ have unleashed.” He gave a trumpeting hum of triumph as he pulled the medicine bottle out from behind the scattered beer bottles on the counter. He stopped when his words caught up, and he turned to look at him with wary eyes. 

Yeah, yeah, he was here. He knew that, but you’re not supposed to admit you know that. Those were the rules. But what about summoning? What the fuck were wards? Did he mean the church that went up in flames? _Did it go up in flames?_ His own words weren’t as eloquent, stuttered out slowly. “Wait, what? Rewind that back and double down, what happened? What did we do?”

Laughter again, as he tilted back and lounged floating in the air idly. His tail held the cane now, and he made a note that it was prehensile. “I take back what I said about you being clever.”

“Yeah, you do that. Now fucking explain!” Again with that sharp tone, very akin to his namesake as he growled out his words now. He pulled out a couple pills, swallowed them down with the cold water, and focused on making a quick meal. He turned back to him to find him perched on the counter he’d just cleared off with his wide grin back in place. _‘Goddamn it, I need his name. Don’t know why I do, but I just know I do.’_ He was distracted from his thoughts when the other spoke again. 

“Let me weave a proper tale for you then, so you can understand the stakes here.” He lifted his hands, snapping his fingers just like he did last night, and the world around them phased out into shadows. Around them a light flickered into life, like old film that was constantly trying to burn away at the edges. Just a soft, muted sepia landscape. He spun around until his eyes locked onto the clear point of interest: the church. “That cult everyone was always whispering about because they always do, even when I was still alive everyone spoke in secret about them…those weren’t just legends to scare children from broken down buildings. They existed, they were quite real, and they cursed this land in their own blood and the blood of their sacrifices.” As he spoke, the image focused the building into a clearer image. He could see a shadowy figure standing in front, arching wicked feathered wings on its back. It held its hands out in offering as it walked closer to those doors as other figures appeared at the sides with various tools. 

“They roamed the land, taking in their gods name at their own will. It took much too long before they were chased off the main land, to that island where the fog kept them hidden. They were led by a preacher who’s voice carried to the many hearts and thoughts of those who couldn’t stand on their own anymore—he preyed on the broken, the used…the outcast. He preached that to bring about their owed peace…they had to first destroy the world around them and build it anew from the ashes of the old. So said his God, that whispered in his ear.” As he spoke the world seemed to glitch, and that calming sepia tone was replaced with bloody red and flickering fires, and the shadowy figure was larger as he lifted his hands toward the sky. Meteors fell down around him as he lifted a tome and he could feel the hope he held as he spoke, as if he couldn’t see the chaos around him. He could see red rolling down his arms, and he realized the figure was bleeding as the meteors made impact around him, as quiet screaming erupted in the space between the walls. He swallowed something building up in his throat, the vision around him matching the one he saw last night. 

Then everything flashed back to that washed out color it was before, this time the various figures gathered around what were clearly the old burning pyres he’d seen the remnants of with his own eyes. The preacher he know knew was still large, actually having gained a bit of height and more importantly—a second set of wings spreading out beneath the original set on his lower back. He had also gained three figures that stood close to him. And standing directly behind him was something taller and more menacing, with gnarled teeth and too many eyes. “He thought the voice of God spoke to him, but it was never a God speaking over his shoulder into his little human ear. There are dark and hungry things in this world, things older than all of us—things that are always waiting for the right ear, the right mind. And as he was whispered secrets of his Garden of Eden he so desperately sought, he took sacrifice after sacrifice—willing or unwilling—and burned them on those holy pyres of his as he spoke on how they were now pure.” Some of the figures were being led to sacrifice, some fighting frantically to get loose and run. The preacher led one of the figures that had been standing beside him forward. They lit up in flames, and that screaming was back and it was definitely intensified by a particular bellowing. The chosen important figure had clearly not consented.

The being behind this preacher was getting bigger, and he could almost feel its hunger like needles against his own spine. “And then when he’d come so close, skirting those circles that would bring about his vision, to the apocalypse his voice wanted so badly…the land took back what it was owed from everything he took from it. Swallowed them home and trapped their souls and their powers into another realm, sealing them safely to different territories where they couldn’t harm you fragile mortals. Those ancient things have ancient enemies, and they like this world whole.” The earth quaked around them, and the earth cracked open as the screaming stopped to give way to a guttural growl that echoed with multiple voices. Blinding white chains broke free from the dirt to latch around that menacing being and pulled it slowly into the ground. The preacher’s wings fell away, and despair radiated through his being as he watched portals open like tears in the sky and pulled him and his companions into separate places.

The scenery fell into darkness once more and he could feel that same panic fill him as the sound of the wind howling ripped that terrifying growl and those desperate cries to shreds. “And that power that surrounded you, spinning out before flashing across the land? That was them being released to finish what they started.” Like the night before, three voided out silhouettes stood out sharply against the crackling static of the darkness. He could make out very few details of each, and stepping closer didn’t add an advantage because they stayed the same distance away. 

One was clearly a slender, willowy woman with flowers and the strong cloying scent of dry tobacco that wafted from her as he focused on her image made his head hurt and little flickering lights prickled into view at the corners of his eyes that made him want to go to her. He dragged his eyes away from her, and the feeling faded away. The next image was a tall, muscular man with long, spiraling horns that arched back from his head. He was scarred to Hell, burns rippling along his arms if the sudden stinging along his arms was any indication. He wore a terrifying grin, dog tags were hanging from his neck, and he knew this being was vicious and blood thirsty. Always looking for the next hunt, the next kill to add to his belt. Iron and rot wafted from him, and the heavy scent made his stomach churn suddenly.

It took more effort than he’d like to admit to turn his attention away from him as those prey instincts in him stirred restlessly. He looked to the last figure and the image almost conflicted with what he knew. Those two sets of black charred wings were spread out, and wrapped around his hands that were clasped in prayer was a rosary from which a small wooden cross hung from. A halo of pale blue fire hung over his head and that almost holy feeling he was filled with damn near dropped him to his knees at it twisted at his fear. He had to close his eyes to look away and when he opened them again he was back in his trailer. 

He looked around, blinking rapidly as he adjusted to reality once more. Everything fell into place and he stumbled back a step to lean against the counter. “Holy shit.” The words were whispered quietly as he understood everything. He didn’t doubt that, fuck no he’d seen it with his own eyes. This shit was real, and it was here in this world. Everything he’d ever really been scared of suddenly existed and he was shivering in some sort of sensed anticipation that came with that sort of dread. 

Now came the loudest laughter the creature had emitted yet, rumbling like the thunder that came with dry lightning. How long had this being existed, how long had any of them? “None of this was ever holy.”

The concept was enough to have him laughing now too, dropping his sandwich on the counter and abandoning it. He couldn’t get that dead taste out of the back of his mouth. “You can say that again.”

The demon flickered out of sight briefly before appearing across from him with the sandwich in hand. “Why would I need to? Are you hard of hearing?” He asked as he cocked his eyebrow, toasting the food between his pressed hands before taking a large bite and giving a sound of taunting approval. 

That caught him off guard and set him to laughing again. He pushed off the counter, taking slow shaky steps to the bathroom to find the mouthwash. “No, fuck, it’s a figure of speech.” _‘Push past this shit, bite your tongue. It’s a whole lot right now but you’ll figure it out, Sharks. You fucking got this.’_

“Humans…” The words were mumbled around food, floating somewhere near his ear behind him. Privacy was suddenly a concern he’d never thought he’d have to have, but he was regardless thankful for the distraction. He was a nobody, and last night he’d made a big decision to take on the most terrifying quest. What the fuck had he been thinking, he wasn’t a _hero._ No one cheered for Sharky Boshaw, they avoided him out of fear of getting blown up beside him or finding their homes and businesses set on fire. But here he was, with the fate of the world in his hands—because there’s no way that that destruction would stay isolated to Hope County—and no one to help him besides a demon, a being that he just confirmed the very existence of. 

“Demons…” He murmured in return as he reached the bathroom and found the mouthwash. He swished around a mouthful, spitting into the sink . “What’s your name? You’re helping me, right? Gotta know your name, homie.” He asked the question before he ducked down to grab a mouthful of water directly from the sink. He repeated the process again before he stood back up to wipe at his wet goatee with his hands. The demon frowned before reaching over to pull a hand towel from where it was hanging up beside him. He held the item out in offering, and Sharky hesitated for a minute before taking it.

“Since I know yours and these ties last only until the required task is complete…why not?” He listened to the other as he lit up at being allowed to introduce himself, before he began wiping his face with the gifted rag. “I go by many titles. I was once the Baptist, in charge of cleansing all those new souls that joined the ranks of the cult Angels. Since my…transformation, I have been the Construct of Chaos, the Monster of Eden’s Island. The shadows at the corners of your eyes on a full moon.” He dropped it into the sink, and he could see the demon eyeing it and noticeably frowning at him. When he moved away, the other slipped past him to retrieve the rag and hang it up while grumbling something about being sloppy.

He laughed at both the words and the action, before deciding to head out onto the porch to smoke a cigarette. “I meant something I could say without having to take a fucking break in the middle of for a deep breath of air.” He could hear the demon following him as he opened the door, holding it open when he had stepped outside to let his company get by.

“I was getting to that, you insufferable pin cushion.” The demon stopped to hiss the words out, before he flickered and appeared on the railing of the tiny porch. “For the sake of brevity, and for your simple mind, you can call me by my name in life: John.”

Sharky laughed now, as he rooted through his pockets to find cigarette pack, and he did a little dance when he found it. He lit one quickly, before finally responding to the demon. “Unexpectedly simple. I like it.” The other was eyeing him now, specifically the stick of tobacco balancing between his lips. He offered a grin before he removed another and offered it to the demon that was already smoking in another sense.

John snatched it from him gently but quickly, placing it between his lips and lighting it with the tip of a finger. “Lucky me, I won the flesh suit’s approval.” Despite his words, he was watching him with a smile of his own.

He chuckled now, letting himself lean against the door he just shut behind him. “Oh fuck man, I think I’m gonna like you.” He looked past the fire pit, past the trailers circling it to look at the mountains behind them. The sky above was blue and massive, and when he glanced to the demon he found he’d turned around on the railing to watch the skies just as eagerly as he was. He seemed peaceful as he watched them, and he felt a flash of shame that he didn’t have wings. “So tell me where we’ve gotta start. What I need to know. You showed me some shit, but who were those shadows? The ones that looked like future bosses you gotta fight in some kinda video game.” _‘Who even knows if he knows what video games are. He look like…antiques do when mixed with modern shit. But it came from something before video games right? The term bosses?’_

“Those are the ‘bosses’ you’ll have to fight. They’ll no doubt settled back into their bodies soon, its only a matter of time before they figure out their powers are back and then they’ll start reaping the land a lot more effectively than they could in life. When they were alive they were just humans like you. Weak little things with drugs and carrying voices.” John responded, eyes not leaving the sky as he spoke. His tail swayed softly as he gave a thoughtful hum. “Though you’re at an advantage—there were supposed to be four, but plans didn’t quite work out the way _he_ wanted them to. Now there’s only three and you’re not entirely human, if we want to look on the bright side.” Now he chose to look at Sharky, and he nodded quietly.

“Okay, cool. I kinda got an idea on what those powers were. I felt ‘em when I looked at each of them.” He started explaining his own thoughts before the facts caught up to him quickly. “That’s a lot to dump on someone with a fucking smile, John. What does that even mean, there were supposed to be four?” The first one had his mind reeling back to the flickering images of the cult, and the unwillingly comrade he could still hear screaming in his head. Then the last piece fell into place and he froze up. “Hold the fuck up—what does _‘not entirely human’ EVEN FUCKING MEAN?”_ His voice rose louder than he had meant it to, but he stifled it back down. Now that he thought about it, he wasn’t even sure if Hurk was still here. _‘Could he even see John? Or do I just look like I’m talking to myself to everyone else?’_

“We are alone. Your companion left this morning with his tail between his legs. You are not the only one that can see me.” John’s attempt at reassurance caught him off guard, and once again he wondered if the other could read his mind. He only received a smile in return before the demon continued speaking. “And you signed the contract, you saw what you would become. I’m not big on the whole visual contract prophetic dream myself, but that’s how it works. You were given some of my ‘essence’ for lack of a better word, because there’s no way a human could damage them effectively enough. You bare my mark, which ties us together and makes defending you easier. You’re fire resistant and your endurance and senses have been greatly increased. I’m not quite sure what happens when the contract is complete though.” He began listing things off on his fingers as he continued, before he dropped them to tap a finger against his chin in a mockery of a thoughtful expression. “You may return to being a human, or you’ll become entirely a demon. I suppose we’ll find out together, won’t we?”

“Well fuck.” It was simple, but it had the other in good humors despite the stern expression the demon was attempting to give him.

“Perhaps you shouldn’t be doing rituals in very haunted churches under full moons, hmmm?” John asked as he cocked a well trimmed eyebrow at him. He puffed at his cigarette, blowing the smoke out towards him in rings. “What did you think would happen? Sunshine and roses? You felt the power tingling on your skin and the warning bells in the back of your skull, you’re open to it. Why were you so foolish to agree to mess with spells you can’t read?” He chuckled before shaking his head slowly. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m absolutely thrilled to be able to leave that cursed island—and you are, simply put, a very good listener. Instinct driven, but not delusional.”

He gave a harsh sound that was supposed to be some kind of laugh towards the supposed compliments. He threw his hands up, exasperated. “Fucking nothing was supposed to happen! This shit isn’t supposed to be real!” The confession was surprising, but he kept on going as he paced the tiny area he had to work with. “You know not to look out the windows at night, and you don’t follow _any sound_ coming from the woods out here at night. You don’t piss on trees without apologizing—we all know the rules! But it’s not supposed to be real, its all supposed to just be precautions.”

“Then I’m here to be the bearer of bad news, boy. But those things in the woods are nothing compared to the things that were sealed away with dark intentions and a lot of time to brood. You can process this as you wish, but here is the truth.” The demon’s voice broke his concentration, and he spun on his heels to listen to him again. “You don’t go too deep into the Whitetails late in the evening because no matter where you go you’ll feel Jacob’s breath on the back of your neck as he stalks you into a paranoid frenzy. He can’t touch you, but he can speak to you so long as you’re in his woods—those twisted, gnarled pines that grow so thick they make the ground black.” Once again, the world around him flickered into another view, of the Whitetails he’d never been brave enough to enter. It had always felt like something was pacing along the treeline, angry at being trapped and hungry for destruction.

The scenery changed to the familiar thinner woods that broke up the meadows and fields of the eastern part of the county that always had some signs of a hazy mist throughout the land . “When you hike in the Henbane, you hike on a clear day and never wander from the trail because no matter how far you go into the woods, the fog will swallow you the moment you divert course and it will always bring you to the banks of the river. You don’t pick flowers in the clearings that seem to always be relocating themselves, because that is how you call Faith to your side…she’ll take your hands and lead you to Walk the Path and no one will ever see you again.” He shuddered at the thought of the giggling he’s heard in those trees before, his home being among the land just described.

Once more the world flickered around them, this time the lands of the county to the west. This area was a bit sparser, far more pastures and crop fields than trees—the heart of the county’s farm lands. “As for the last one, he is a special circumstance. You would think the preacher would be tied to that island, but since he threw me into that flame and I had already made my own deals…I was tied to it instead. In turn his place is where I would have been sealed away had he kept me around ‘til the end. In Holland Valley, underneath the very fields where their crops grow so well…Joseph’s the reason there’s always a celebration around Harvest time, why you don’t pick up anyone traveling with just a bible alongside the road, and why you don’t follow those lights in the evening glare—no matter how holy they look.”

He listened to each description, vague as it was, until they were standing back on his porch. That was getting easier to follow, the whole illusionary landscape trick. “And what you do?”

The snort he received was almost answer enough, but John merely shook his head before answering. “Whatever the Hell I want.” He finished his own cigarette, and he grasped it between his fingers as held it up as it burnt up and turned into ash that blew away in the breeze.

“Fair enough, but still not what I meant.” He responded, shaking his head a bit as he put out his own cigarette. He motioned around them almost lazily, at the magic he’d just used twice to make his points. “I saw what you did, your whole charade. But even if you were leading me along last night that was all still a show the entire walk up there. The way it looked clear when we were on the island, how the trees got all dark—the fucking doors! You were trying to scare us off until the moment we went too far, then you took advantage of it. You just didn’t count on drunken idiots with the luck of something awful to have that particular scroll.” He was smiling, feeling more and more at ease as he slowly started to accept this new absurd reality he lived in. But a big question was toying at the edges of his mind. A few were in fact, but he settled on the most prominent for now. “Were all the local legends just y’all?”

“Not at all. There are creatures everywhere, with the ability to be unseen. All the things you fear running into on a dark night, as well as the Fair Folk. They are their own force with their own rules, and I believe they may have had a hand in sealing away my… _the others_ the first time. It was them—or some old God we have no hope of understanding. Neither sounds preferable, to be honest.” John answered the question quickly, confirming more of his fears and sending him down the path to those nervous giggles he always had.

He felt like his skin was crawling and he turned around to head back inside. “So, change of topic but the subject is sort of related?” He dropped down onto his beat up couch before he turned to meet the other’s eyes as he appeared beside him on the thin cushions.

The demon tilted his head curiously, before lifting a hand and waving it. “Go ahead and ask, Charlemagne. Communication is key.” He realized now that he hadn’t seen the other’s cane in a few minutes. Could he just materialize things from thin air? Could he send them back? _‘So many questions.’_

“Call me Sharky. Anyway, so if demons are real, does that make Hell real? Its another realm, you said. How’s that work exactly? Is it like a filter over this world that lets you interact with it but everything’s just on fire? Or is it all red moons and suns like apocalypse movies and shit?” He was rattling off his questions, much to the growing concern he could see forming in the demon’s eyes. _‘Scared of a little curiosity, John?’_ “How about Heaven? If Hell’s real, does that mean the churches were all right about a man sitting on a cloud in the sky with a big white beard—kinda like Santa Claus but not as fun and more uptight? Or is he cool?” He was grinning more with each new expression of frustration on the demon’s face.

“Do I look like I know about God?” The statement was harsh, before his tone quieted softly in his own form of respect for the order of things. “As charming as your little rant is, I’ll get one thing out in the open. I didn’t embrace religion in life, and now I most certainly can’t embrace it in death. I believe that might very well be the end of me, and I simply cannot let that happen. I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the whole dying experience the first time around, and while I’m not entirely dead…I’m not out of existence. Let’s keep it that way, shall we?”

“Alright. Sounds like a deal, I suppose.” Sharky agreed, before letting his head drop back as he thought about the scenario he found himself in. “So, we fight all the things with my newfound demony powers, and save the world. Anything else I need to know before we start getting our shit together.”

“Not currently. You have a basic grasp on it.” The demon responded before finally speaking up again. “You have possibly two days before they start really moving things. I suggest we use that time to train a bit, and gather supplies.”

“You got it, Johnny.” He replied, and he grinned when he heard the other give a sound of disgust.

“Don’t call me that.” The other replied, and he laughed a bit before he let them fall into a contemplative silence. 

_‘I really fucked shit up this time. Now I gotta fix it.’_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone new, feel free to talk to me on tumblr! narcis-the-monk.tumblr.com  
> I've been sitting on this so long, its surprising to see it go up.


	3. You're Looking at an Absolute Zero

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sharky learns exactly how those new powers work, along with a little more about the demons--including his own.

After he’d gotten another nap in, as well as finally managing to stomach some food, they went outside after a whole lot of insistence from John. The demon kept repeating that he needed to get started on figuring out his powers. As of this moment, he stood in the heart of the large fire pit. The ground beneath him had been doused in kerosene, and he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t more excited than he was nervous. But for sanity’s sake, he looked over at the demon watching him curiously to force a question past his wide grin.

“So you’re sure about this?” He was bouncing from foot to foot as he waited for the other’s answer.

“Pretty damn sure, yes. IF you end up becoming a demon in the long run, it’ll be something to do with fire.” John answered simply, tilting his head a bit as he hummed thoughtfully. He was watching him with a sort of dazed look on his face, and he felt prickling along his scalp just beneath the skin like something was tracing along his brain. “Seems you have a strong tie to the element already.”

“Hell yeah I do!” He shouted in response before dazing off himself momentarily as memories of the dancing, twisted flames he loved so much filled his mind. The fact that he could touch it now, without being burnt, seemed too good to be true. “Fire’s fucking…amazing.” The words were accompanied with a happy, light sigh. The demon merely shook his head after a second.

“Like some kind of star crossed lover…” John murmured the words before he waved a hand at his companion. “Go on, light it up then.” The words had him digging through his pockets for the lighter he needed, stopping to take a deep breath to steady his hands again.

“Well here goes…” He lifted the lighter up, and instead of immediately dropping it he held his hand over the flame to test it. He could feel warmth over his skin, but the blistering heat didn’t set in. Instead, his hand merely darkened with soot where it licked along his skin. It began to crawl up his hand, and his eyes widened in indescribable joy as he cupped his hand to hold it like a butterfly that had landed on him. “Holy shit, that is fucking amazi—OH FUCK!” As he started speaking his excitement, the still lit lighter dropped from his hand. He had just enough time for a single thought— _’Hope that works everywhere’_ —before the kerosene in the ground burst into life.

He closed his eyes as he waited, and when nothing inherently seemed to disastrously change around him he opened his eyes again. Fire was crawling along his limbs, extending from him like it had become a part of him. It felt like an extension of his soul, and as his excitement flared and resurfaced so did the inferno engulfing his body. He danced around and it stayed with him, attached to his muscles in a way and shifting with his skin. He was incredibly glad he threw on clothes that didn’t matter, as he found them in no way as resistant as he was. He’d have to find something that didn’t burn away with the heat. 

He slipped into his own head, and as his focus continued down the road of his fire his pulse slowed and calmed. He watched the fire lessen down to a shifting blue armor, the way it looks when you set hand sanitizer on fire. He looked over to John, who had finally moved closer with a lit cigarette balanced between two fingers as he floated above the ground.

The demon’s smooth voice, carrying with it the smell of burning wood as well as tobacco, rested just by his ear and he shivered slightly in response. “Try to focus it in your hand.” Well that was vague and almost annoying, but the other was floating close and lifting his hand up. He followed the action with his own arm, watching the other’s hand. He could see the spirals on their palms matched now, and at the center of John’s hand a flame sparked up. It began spiraling in his hand quickly, and the demon threw his arm to the side to launch the tiny flame towards a target. It blossomed quickly on the pillar of broken tree limbs and spread across the tinder beneath hungrily. _‘Alright, yeah. I can do that.’_

He focused on his hand now, calling the fire forward. Trails of yellow and orange flickered along in little lines down his arms to his palm, and as the tiny life sparked up in his hand he focused on trying to spiral it around like he’d just watched John do. But he sped it up too quickly, got too eager he supposed, and it launched itself from his hand and towards one of the trailers circling them. In a blur of blue and trailing smoke, John blinked out before reappearing just in time to catch the ball of fire. He turned to look at him as he snuffed it out in his hands and cocked an eyebrow at him. “Focus. I won’t tell you not to be excited. You’re in your element for the first time it would seem, and we don’t have the time to be patient. But you do need to focus. So long as that’s in _your_ control _you_ are responsible for its actions.”

“Yeah, sorry. Magic in general is new, and this is…you know…my shit, specifically. So I’m all hopped up and excited. Better than being in shock but still kinda…just a waiting disaster.” Sharky started off excited, and those blue flames started growing along his fingertips, his hands catching fire as he waved them around while he talked. But everything dimmed as he realized he needed to be chiller. He had to cool down because he was fireproof—but the rest of the world wasn’t. Before everything died out completely on him, he heard John’s voice again.

“Indeed. But do you know what else is impatient, eager to consume, and excitable in just as many ways?” The way he was talking, trying to invoke some kind of grounding feeling in him. It further enforced the idea in his head that the other had some way of feeling what he was, or seeing into his thoughts. He still hadn’t confirmed it, but before he could get too caught up on that path he heard that level tone again. “Ignis. Fire. Take advantage of that fact. Move quickly, and confidently, and it will be happy to jump from your fingers and allow you control.” He watched his hands moving as he spoke, and the flexing of his muscles. The glow of his eyes as he felt confidence igniting again in his own chest.

He took a deep breath, pulling his gaze away from the other’s. He focused on pulling the power forward, to let the element travel along his fingertips once more. “Wait so…is fire _alive?_ ” The way he kept talking about it, like a it was a separate entity from him—and yet it felt a part of him. This entire scenario was both insanely cool and yet confusing as fuck. _'The right amount of complicated to fuck me up.’_ But to his delight, John merely floated in front of him appearing almost excited to talk.

“Yes. Most things are. It’s one or the other; it’s alive or its dead. Either one has substantial power. Combine the two…” He held both his hand out, before joining them together to motion at himself. Then he moved back a bit to set his feet down, and the ground at his soles began to burn beneath him. “You create a demon. A creature who’s body is trapped in a state of reanimation—never truly dying—with rampant control over elements—things which have life flowing through them. In turn, it makes them immortal. But once you gain that perk, it comes with a long list of ridiculous ways it could be changed back to the status of mortal.”

A lightbulb went off in his head, and he knew he looked hopeful when he asked the question. “So that means all the others have some kind of list of ways we could use to revert them back?” The other watched him carefully, stiffening up slightly as he realized he was divulging sensitive information about himself as well.

“Oh no. No, by just reversing the process—which I’m not sure can be done—they would wither away and die. They were humans before, centuries ago. Humans that would have long since died. They’d become nothing but dust.” John’s answer was phrased carefully, and he paused to watch as his own face fall a bit before he finished. “What I meant is you have a list of ways you can meet your untimely demise. But they are outrageously specific.”

“Ah. Damn, thought we might could…” Sharky trailed off, dropping his gaze down to the ground. He heard a huff, but he continued to watch the ground as the other spoke to him again. He chose to watch his skin as its edges shifted and faded with the calm blue heat of the fire still remaining.

“Save them?” The question itself sounded like it was truly ludicrous. It really was, he supposed, but he just wanted to help. The demon leaned over to catch his attention, to trap his gaze into the burning blue that matched the fire covering him. As the other stood up, he lifted his gaze to watch him curiously. _‘Some kind of joke about ‘eyes you could just get lost in’, maybe a pickup line, in that. But right now, its never been truer.’_ John gave him a knowing smile and he blushed faintly in response to it, thankful when he continued speaking. “I’m going to give you your first real lesson, beyond these powers. You can’t save everyone. You’re going to be a hero, whether you want to be or not. You may not receive recognition…but you’re going to be in charge of a fate no one else can comprehend. You’ll have to make choices. And you can’t. Save. Everyone.” That charming smile slowly hardened as he continued on, and he had a feeling his words were for both of them by the end of it. “They had their chance.”

The words fell heavy between them, and he let the other meditate on his own words. When enough time had passed though, the urge to speak became overwhelming. “So what do I need to do?” He blurted out the words in an attempt at a subject change, and he felt true relief to hear the other laughing again.

He was in front of him again, closer this time as he repeated the process he already explained, changing the words in a way that clicked better for him. “Focus it into your hand into a shape you find most natural. Don’t copy me if it doesn’t work for you.” John traced his fingers down his own arm, showing the traces of blue glowing veins just beneath his paper thin skin like additional veins. It pooled out into his hand, into a twisting shape of controlled chaos. “When you’ve got it, throw it towards your target. It’ll come naturally, and when that happens your impulsive nature will help out in the long run. But right now…we must accomplish that first task.” When he looked up to catch the demon’s gaze, he found him grinning again as they both realized how’d quick he’d been to openly gawk at the other.

He swallowed a lump of embarrassment that had formed in his throat before he pushed past it awkwardly. “Anything else?”

John stepped forward, reaching out to touch along his already out stretched arm where his tattoo was. “No, not really. You already bend fire almost willingly, you just couldn’t hold it in your hand before now—couldn’t speak to it. Now you can, and you take to it like the forest fire you are.” The words were almost purred to him, as he added that effect that let him see those glowing blue veins under his own skin. “But the concept of being able to do so—that is the real problem here. You need to accept that, and you’ll flourish.” Seeing that essence, that magic, flowing beneath his own skin—it was like the world clicked two inches to the left and finally it felt right.

When he turned to thank him, he found the other much closer than he expected and he burst into a fit of nervous giggles. “I’m sorry. It’s just…I like the way you talk and I’m not good with compli—and you’re really close—" Every new attempt to explain himself sent him into a new fit, earning him a very confused expression from the other. “Thank you…I think. Oh fuck—"

The other held up one of those stained fingers again, and he immediately cut himself off to fall into silence. “Please do me a favor and stop talking immediately or I’ll never pay you a compliment again.”

“Alright, that’s cool.” He responded before he thought about it, then he immediately mimed zipping his lips shut as the other stepped back until he was once more in front of him. _‘Besides, he admitted that was a compliment.’_

“Now just…sit down. Close your eyes. And picture your soul twisting with the fire. Its crackling green, twisting with gold and orange.” He did as he was told, moving to sit down only when the other did though. He closed his eyes and to picture what he was told, but the images were hard to form. _‘See through my eyes.’_ The words echoed in his mind, and he opened his eyes. It was startling when he realized he was looking at himself , and that those words had been literal. The world was much more colorful around them, and when he could see what the other meant. There was a dancing rope of color whirling around him; deep, rich greens mingling with the golds and oranges of the fire inside of him. He watched them coil and twist in a mesmerizing way as the other kept talking.

“It’s life and energy and rebirth…its chaotic when it isn’t controlled and it will snuff out in the wrong hands. They meld together so well, they really do. Stop fighting the meshing, accept the burn in your veins and let it become a whole new energy.” As he spoke, he started noticing the spots of colors in that ever moving chain trying to bleed into each other. As he pondered why they had ever been separated they started merging and he felt the burning in his veins immediately. He hissed lowly, but found himself relaxing as that kaleidoscope finally combined into a shimmering aurora borealis that circled around him. “Now let those shifting lights slip back into your body. Breathe them in deeply and think about what it is you want to do.” He took that deep breath he desperately needed, and the colors slithered down into his lungs until they emanated out and consumed him. 

“Think about the fire growing in your hand. Now shape it into what you want, its asking for your guidance.” He watched his hand open, before the magic—now tangible—flowed down his arm and pooled into his hand until it shaped itself into a small dragon, crawling about his hand and giving small soundless cries of what he knew was joy. “Good. Now picture what you’d find most comfortable in your hand, what the two of you together can create to be wielded.” The dragon seemed to reform itself as he moved to close his hand around a blade. “Very good.” When he felt it there in his hand, he quickly flipped it around. “Now throw it.” He tossed it towards the target behind John, and when it left his hand he snapped back into his own body in time to see the fire-knife hit home and consume the target eagerly.

“And there we have it.” John stated, and he looked at him sporting another of his cocky smirks. His own confident grin took over, and he was jumping to his feet and dancing around with renewed excitement.

“Holy shit!” Sharky remarked, whooping loudly before spinning in a circle. Flames danced along his arms and shoulders, and he turned to form another blade. He threw it and just as easily as the last one, into the already burning target and the flame on it increased brightly. “Holy shit, did you fucking see that! That is so FUCKING COOL. That’s awesome. I’m awesome. I’m gonna kick so much ass.”

“Congratulations are in order yes, but those are not moving targets.” The demon responded as he clapped, clearly trying not to dampen his spirits. But he instead just danced closer to him, immediately regretting not setting up some kind of music to play while they did this.

“I don’t mean to brag, but I have been hunting before.” He retorted, turning to mime shooting his shotgun. When he accidentally blasted a target away with a surprisingly quick firebolt he jumped back before he started cheering again. “Motherfucker, do I love this shit! That fucking worked? I’m fucking stoked that worked. Oh man, I’m feeling giddier than a cat hunting in a cat nip warehouse.“

“Have you gone hunting something that was also hunting you?” The question stumped him briefly and he spun around to look at John with an attempt at calmer amusement.

“Not that I was actively aware of.” There we go, that was honest. He’d hunted deer, and mostly in stands. Not actively moving on the ground because more often than not he’d been drunk and there all kinds of things you didn’t want to run into unprepared in this neck of the Montana woods; cougars, bears, moose—those are just the big ones. _‘Don’t even get me started on turkeys and wolverines, fuck that particular brand of noise.’_

“Close, but not quite close enough. At least one of your opponents is out for real blood at his own hands. The others are liars, but he has always been upfront about how badly he wants to feast. He’s the real threat when it comes to combat; he’s trained his whole existence to do just that.” And with that, he was brought back out of his thoughts of wildlife fears and back to the very real—very much worse—demon fears he still had to face. He thought about the one in question, immediately recalling the name John had given him.

“Jacob, right? You said his name earlier.” He asked the question, and for a moment there was a far away gleam to the demon’s eyes as he thought about his answer carefully. As he spoke, his voice sound hollow and vacant like he was trying to put distance between himself and his words.

“Yes. In life, he cared strongly for his family and his soldiers, but everyone else he could kill without batting an eye. He’d fought in wars, and even when he had come home he was still fighting them. Then he hunted a lot when he wasn’t training his men once he’d joined Joseph.” He stared just past him, off in some unseen vision of his own.

Despite feeling like he shouldn’t invade this moment, he had to ask the question that was plaguing him. “How do you know all this?”

Regarding him carefully, John repeated what he’d said earlier. “I was the Baptist. Why would I not know the Soldier?”

He felt relief at the fact the other was confirming his thoughts, instead of leaving him to make his guesses like taking shots in the dark. “Okay, so you were the figure dragged to the pyres. Thought so.” 

“Clever boy.” The words were purred close to his ear, John having snuck up behind him suddenly before he shifted back into view again. “Yes, I knew them. I was to be his—Joseph’s—Famine, but I did not agree with the whole bringing about the end of times. I liked existing too much for me to want to participate in his plans.” The confession was a quick one, and he wondered how he’d ended up a demon without those ties. But the other kept going and he dropped the thought in favor of listening. He could always ask later. “Jacob was his War, Faith his Death. And he was Conquest.” The last word was accompanied by a laugh as he shook his head. “He was…quite pretentious, really.”

He found himself laughing along with the other now. “Yeah, sounds like it.” They trailed off into a silence again as the sun started to set. They went back to practicing, and by the end of it he had a little better control over these new powers. He wanted to keep talking, never really having the opportunity to have someone nearby who could respond to him as often as he truly wanted. 

As he stressed over what to say or how to spark up another conversation, his fire completely doused now as they were once more on his porch each with a cigarette, the sun lowered the rest of the way over the horizon. Shortly after, the mist started rolling into his trailerpark castle. John stiffened up beside him, and before he could ask why he saw little specks of light being carried along with the wall of mist. “Well, that’s new.”

“We need to go inside.” John stressed the words, moving down the steps to stand in front of him now.

“Why?” As he asked the question, he suddenly picked up soft giggling before he heard a quiet song being sung by a sweet faceless voice. “What is that?” Now he could see shadows moving in the spreading greenish haze and he was tense now as well.

“Go inside, Sharky. It seems someone has found her feet again.” He stood up this time, and John began pushing lightly at him. He opened the door, only shutting it when his own demon joined him inside. “I should have known she would regain her footing quicker than either of the others.” He moved to the windows, glaring out them before he lowered the blinds and pulled the curtains over them.

He moved to grab a couple of beers from the fridge, puffing at the still lit stick of tobacco between his lips. “So, since she’s apparently out there now…you wanna tell me about this Faith?” He asked as he moved to the table, dropping into one of the mismatched chairs as he placed the drinks on the table and tapped the ash threatening to drop into the ash tray there.

“She is not out there, not yet. But things drawn to her are. And fine, I will.” The other had joined him and snatched one of the drinks without being asked or even told to brood quietly on his own agreement to talk. “She helped his followers to ‘see’. She used herbs and flowers to blind others to the real world momentarily and in a sense gave them demon sight. She could heal anything and harm anyone all with the same tools. She clung the tightest to the Father’s words, and its honestly the biggest tragedy. She could have been…incredible.” There was that far away look again, and he felt a moment of almost sympathy. These were his friends, and he’d roped him in to fighting them. They didn’t necessarily seem to be _John’s_ enemies, not with the way he spoke. If anyone was, it seemed to be Joseph. “Instead he plucked her wings from her back before she ever knew she had them.”

The silence threatened to swallow them once more, and he spoke the first thought to pop forward. “I’m sorry, you know. That I pulled you into this shit.” This earned him a new look of irritation and another huff.

“Then I ask that you cease that immediately. Feeling sorry for me…how dare you?” He growled the words out, and with those fangs he knew that was an unspoken promise he could back up. “Like I said, they made their choice. I made mine, and they didn’t happen to blend together very well.”

“How are they different?” More questions, anything to backpedal the mistake he’d made in their progress. “I mean, how did _you_ become a demon?”

The other sighed, before popping the cap off his beer with his thumb before taking a very long drink. _‘I wonder if demons can even get drunk, or if that’s just a habit from life?’_ He smiled and made a note to ask that one in the future before he started speaking again. “I made a deal, when I was still alive. When Joseph told me his plan I decided I didn’t want to go out like that. I thought about leaving, but I knew if he found out I would still…no one was above his vision.” He was being vague, but it was better than another full on vision surrounding them. Good old fashioned dialogue and he appreciated that. “So I stole his book, summoned my own creature forth. And I made my deal. I would become one when I died, and I’d carry any task or purpose given to me, so long as I wasn’t tied to _him._ ” He hissed the last word, taking another drink before continuing. “Whatever found me that night was more of a trickster than what had found Joseph. It found the request amusing enough, and it took a bit of my blood to seal the deal. When I was forced on that pyre, I went to another plain of existence—the catch that I was tied there with just a thin filter between our plains. But when whatever sealed the Father and his Heralds away, it spared me due to us serving different demons. I’m sure it helped that there were quite a few times I sabotaged different things to delay his rituals and several sacrifices were interrupted when captives somehow got loose.” He hummed lowly, lifting his other hand to give a wishy-washy gesture as he laughed quietly at his own antics. “I’m quite petty when I feel I’ve been wronged.” Was it weird to be thankful to meet a chill demon?

“You’re a fucking riot, you know that right?” He was grinning at the other now, trying to change the subject once more. He opened his own beer finally, opting to use the bottle opener he kept next to the ash tray. He took a long drink, and he followed up his statement only when he noticed the other looking at him curiously. “Its kinda like I hit the jackpot of demon lotteries.”

“Pardon me?”

“You’ve got a great sense of humor, you seem to have more morals than any other demon I’ve heard of—mind you, those experiences are really fucking limited but you get the point—and you’re honestly pretty decent company. But for all I know, you’ve just been buttering me up so I’ll hurry up and finish so you can fuck off to do whatever trickster bullshit you might have been planning for eons.” Sharky explained himself now, jumping a bit when he heard a tapping at the window beside them. He was glad he never opened this one briefly, before he continued to ignore it like he would any other night. 

“First off, partly yes. But another part thinks you are not as terrible as some humans, and I haven’t had had someone to talk to in quite some time. I’ve never really cared about anything that didn’t hurt me; love what loves me and hate what hates me. Not a lot of things have loved me, but quite a few have hated me. It is what it is.” He was glad as the other chuckled, the soft knock sounding at the door making a bit of anxiety spark up in his bones. “And second…eons? Exactly how old you think I am?”

“Twenty four hours ago I didn’t think demons really existed, so cut me so slack here alright homie. It’s not like it shows. How old were you when you died?” He was so thankful for jokes as something skittered across his roof with too many legs to be a squirrel or a raccoon.

John leaned forward, like he was confiding his deepest secret to him. “Thirty-two.”

He laughed at that, admitting to himself he wouldn’t have guessed that. “No fucking shit?” He may not have really known what the appropriate age to think a demon was, he most definitely didn’t look older than twenty five.

“Now who’s buttering up who?” The demon waved a hand, grinning arrogantly beyond the gesture of mock modesty. “But thank you. I do rather like this new look I was given. It’s timeless, if you will.” The pun had them both laughing, and before he knew it they were caught up in offhanded remarks and banter as they faded into their own little world. He wasn’t entirely sure what was happening here, but he was hoping he’d at least made a friend. It’d be easier to face everything he’d been given with someone who’d stand beside him, and the positivity they were attempting to fill his trailer with was enough to drive off the creatures that the mist had brought out. 

It seemed that those other creatures he’d seen had been released as well, spreading out across the land if he had to guess. Maybe they followed the demons, or maybe they just knew magic had taken over and granted them easier access to prey. God, they really had fucked up hadn’t they?

As a silhouette of something suspiciously spider like and the size of a small dog crawled over the window the outside light lit up, he shivered and gave a sound of disgust. _‘Well at least I’m fireproof. Gonna be killing a lot of things with fire.’_

That night it was significantly harder to sleep though.


	4. Such a Pheromone Cult to Terrorize

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first encounter of many...

They started locally, as if they really had a choice. When he woke up John was already at his side, complaining all the while, as he made breakfast and through his morning smoke. He got a small reprieve from the other when he showered, but the moment he tugged his clothes on and opened the door, there he was again. It was like having a dog, honestly, except this one could not only talk—it was more often than not being very sarcastic. And he had to admit he enjoyed it. _‘Never realized how lonely I was…’_

As they sat outside on the tiny porch, he got lost in a moment just eyeing the mist that seemed to part for only the road in and a few trails he knew by heart. “We need to find out what kind of demon she became.” He immediately remembered the giggling from the night before, and the unseen face singing to them— _to him._

“Excuse me? We’re doing what now?” The idea of walking towards that was already nestled in the back of his skull, but hearing it suggested sent shivers down his spine. _‘Bad idea.’_

“Finding out what kind of demon she became.” John moved over to his side, resting his folded arms on the railing like he was with their arms touching. He smiled faintly at that, glad the close proximity brought him back down to the ground. “I know quite a lot. Spirits are a gossipy lot, and the wandering ones would come to the island like it was a hot spot. I could keep up with quite a few things, but I’m not omniscient in any way.” He stared at him for a long minute, squinting at the demon until he followed up that statement. “I am not all knowing.”

“Huh. I thought that came with the whole demon thing. You become one and suddenly you know everything.” He wasn’t sure why he believed that exactly, but it was true at the least. This earned him a laugh and he grinned past the stirrings of fluttering in his chest at the gesture. _‘Focus on his words, this is important. Make friends on your own time.’_

“Absolutely not. That comes from years of being observant and charismatic.” He watched how the corners of his lips creased with his now signature cocky grin, the finer details almost hidden by that perfectly trimmed beard. _‘Focus damn it.’_ He gave silent thanks when the other kept talking. “How else would I have known I could ever leave that island? My patron was vastly different in his verbosity with me. Because I’ve met demons who weren’t tied down. I was always so envious of them, but I knew to ask as many questions as I could. Nothing that can fly free ever truly stays in one place too long, and who knew when I would get other chances to learn. Especially since my knowledge on the occult from my time spent living was not extensive enough for my liking.” He really did love the way he talked, always giving away little things about himself. “In death, there are many voices willing to speak. Spirits…they’re much flightier when it comes to thought. They would tell me things they just experienced or what they heard humans discussing. So I know their ‘legends’ as you referred to them.” John gestured with his hands as he spoke, and he could feel the fabric of his shirt brushing against his skin. But he focused on watching his hands, slender fingers twitching as he gave sweeping gestures he knew were only reigned in because of his close proximity to the demon. “I know the different kinds of demons there are, but I don’t know what they are. Not yet, anyway. Several descriptions overlap.”

He laughed when what he was saying made sense. “So we gotta go poke bears in caves so you can get a look at their markings and shit so you can tell me if it’s a grizzly bear or a brown bear that’s about to eat my ass?”

“Essentially.” No matter how much he expected that laughter, receiving it still made him ridiculously happy. _‘Being social is weird.’_

“Sounds like fun.” He remarked finally, gaze trailing away from the other to the deer trails and the lazy mist curling in climbing tendrils of temptation. He was excited for an excuse to walk towards it honestly, but he felt anxious about this entire thing as well. He was alone in this entire mess with a demon, and he could now control fire and he may not be human anymore. He blinked away the shock of the thought. _‘Guess that’s still settling in.’_

“I do hope so, you’ll be doing this quite a lot.” The dry tone of the demon’s voice brought him back down again and he nodded along.

“So what do I need to do? Anything I need to take?” They needed to get to business, quit wasting time trying to delay doing what they knew needed done.

“Salt, holy water…any holy symbol you believe in, really. As for what to do…walk towards the mist on the trail. Do try to stay on it though, we’re only trying to spot her not get you lost.” He almost jumped when he felt the other’s hand hovering over his arm, and he was quick to grin and jerk his gaze away again in an attempt to hide the forming blush.

“Aww, shucks man. I’m glad to hear you care.”

John scoffed now, withdrawing his hand quickly to lean back and cock an eyebrow at him. “Losing you means we lose this planet. I’m one to play the long game, after all.”

It was blunt and damn near cut throat but ultimately true and he nodded along. “You could just let me think you gave a fuck.” That earned him a smile though and he pushed himself off the railing to head back inside to get ready for the first step of their intel gathering plan. 

“Then it would be unearned, and where’s the fun in that?” He laughed at that as he let the door shut behind him, trusting the other to dodge it. He only grinned when he reappeared, floating before him.

“Got me there. Suppose I deserved that.” He muttered the words he thought to himself, but John merely settled down on his feet in his path again. He realized now he was just a touch taller than the other and he hummed in quiet amusement before he stopped him from moving with a hand to the center of his chest.

“You deserve quite a lot. What that is…I’ve yet to truly see. Don’t let me down.” As John spoke his words, he felt the spiral on his palm pulsating in a comforting warmth that helped ease his nerves a bit. He wondered again about the connection between them again with those marks both of them bore. 

He told himself to say something, and he blurted out something quickly. “Quick question; how do you make water holy?” And just like that they could address the real issues, like would a demon even know how to do that. He felt a tinge of regret when the other removed his palm from his chest to answer his question with surprising ease.

“You bless it. How do I put this in quick terms you’ll understand…hold your hands over it and say _‘I bless this with the power of my fire’_ , and think real hard about burning shit. When it feels done, its done.“ John held his hands in front of himself, overlapping his fingers just a bit to form a dome before he pulled his hands apart and blessed him with very unenthused spirit fingers. “Tadah, its blessed. I told you this was all quite odd in the grand scheme of things. By this logic, anyone can bless anything because the power required is in everyone. You just have to believe in it with your whole being, and if I’ve learned anything about you is that you believe in your element with every ounce of your being. You fill the requirements, and the difficulty of everything has been lessened by your new powers.” He held up two fingers for him before tilting back and resuming his floating as his tail twitched idly. “Second lesson: know everything about the thing you are. I am a demon: I merely lack the ability to preform these actions due to the whole technically undead thing. You are _at least_ still part human. I believe you are exempt from the rules. Lucky you, you live outside the laws.”

“Alright…sounds really easy. Why is that so disappointing?” He mused the question out loud as he went to retrieve a bowl to fill with water, getting himself ready to follow the instructions he had been given. 

“Because its easy. And saving the world shouldn’t be easy.” The tone of his voice indicated the answer should be evident to even him, and once it was out there he knew it to be true and the realization made him hum lowly in agreement.

“Once again…it’s obvious when you say it out loud.” Sharky commented quietly to the other as he filled the bowl with water, forming his hands into the gesture the other had shown him earlier. His concentration never stood a chance when the demon leaned over to give another almost joke that had him giggling nervously.

“My specialties are stating the things no one else is going to and knowing everything there is to know about anything. Standing pretty strong on that first one, the second is always expanding and changing. As we all should be.” He glanced over at his companion, who was floating still and tilted over comically to catch his eye.

“Good specialties to have. Now let me do this bullshit. See if you can go find my canteen.” He was asking politely to have a moment, and the other nodded before popping out of view before he heard rummaging in the next room. 

He focused on the simple task, reciting the words in a clumsy chant. He was still surprised when he felt power flowing through his palms and even more so when he could feel it dripping down into the water like cool caresses against his skin. He kept repeating the words until he felt that coolness pull away and the magic stopped flowing from his hands. He gave a sort of thanks, grinning at the water he thought he could catch glowing with that aura of colors he saw yesterday like early autumn. John appeared back beside him with the requested object in hand. He rinsed it out before he poured the water from the bowl into it slowly over the sink so he didn’t spill any.

He slung that across him, along with a few other basic camping supplies so he looked like just some lost hiker. He also had three different ziploc baggies of salt spread out across him hidden in different pockets. He didn’t start to feel nervous again until he’d pulled his boots on and was already out his door and heading to the nearby trees. He could feel John near him but when he started down the path through the trees he felt the demon fall back a bit. The green mist curled around his ankles, trying to climb his legs as he walked. 

The effects weren’t immediate—he’d been walking for a while until he realized there were little flecks of light sparking up from the mist that reached out to try and take him into that sweet embrace it seemed to promise. There was a spike of fear before the urge to walk off the path and into it sunk into him and started tugging at his limbs. He pushed it off again, trying to almost shield himself from that unwanted temptation flooding him. He walked for another fifteen minutes before he saw a figure in front of him on the trail ahead of him hidden in the mist. 

His heart stopped as the fog parted and gave him a view of who was waiting patiently for him to approach. She had golden brown hair that was braided and interwoven into a flower crown made of yellow bell shaped flowers with deep purple veins. She held her willowy arms out by her sides as she swayed softly, and he noticed as he took a few steps closer there were vines wrapped around her arms. Barbed thorns crowded along them, biting down into her paper thin skin. Around her joints and where her muscles would tightened, blood red petals were sprouting through her skin like beautiful wounds. Her top was barely there lace held together by wildflowers growing from her ribs. A grey skirt hung low on her hips, the edges tattered and worn as it swished around her knees and revealing she was barefoot and there were fresh wounds along her ankles and calves she didn’t seem to notice from walking through the woods like a wild child.

“Faith…” Her named slipped past his lips before he knew what was happening and she gave him a smile in return, lifting her hands to beckon him closer as if she had been waiting for him this entire time. He felt himself moving again, lifting his hands up to take hers as she finally spoke to him.

“You know my name…no one knows my name anymore.” As she spoke in her sing song tone, the smoke that drifted from between her lips carried those specks of light that drifted into his face. The soft green world he was pulled into as she stepped backwards and led him along hardly contrasted with the harmonizing cadence of her voice he felt trapped in. He thought about what she said, and looked forward to make eye contact with her now. Ice blue stained glass, they seemed to almost glow as she hummed softly and he felt a sudden feeling of acceptance flooding through him that had him smiling back.

“That’s a goddamn shame, miss…you seem real sweet.” He followed her along the lazy path as she entwined their fingers as they stepped along the lazy path. 

He felt the ground soften beneath him, tall grass now swaying at their legs. _They weren’t on the path anymore._ Before he could linger on that fear, her soothing voice was caressing the edges of his frantic thoughts until he felt calm again. “You are a charming one, aren’t you? Quick with your tongue and your wit?”

The statement made him laugh, and he shook his head finally as he denied that statement. “No I am not. I am actually the worst at talking, oh boy.” He felt a buzz building in the back of his brain, like he’d smoked a fat blunt and took a walk in the woods. He was glad he had a comparison to make, because the light headed feeling over taking him was making it harder to think. There was a flash of— _bad idea_ —before it was swept away in how comfortable he felt as the sound of moving water registered behind her.

“I think you are.” She told him with a soft smile, and for the moment he could believe her. He blushed a bit and ducked his gaze before they stop and she drifted to his side. “Do you like it here? It’s so peaceful, so full of renewing energy. It’s my favorite place to just get away…” She released his hands to wrap herself around his arm and he looked up to watch what had her attention now. 

The water of the Henbane river flowed at a blissfully slow pace before them. The water was clear and deep, and the dark tones littering the deep blue hues promised hidden secrets in them. He felt himself calming at the sight as well, and he could almost feel it coursing through her hands against the skin of his arm bared by the pushed up sleeve. He felt her lift his hand up to observe the spiral in his palm, tracing the burned lines with her fingertips with a hum before she released his hand in favor of resting her head on his shoulders. The flowers braided and twisted into a crown on her head carried that cloying scent of tobacco and he felt his eyelids drooping a bit as he breathed it in deeply. 

“It’s so wonderful…our own little piece of Eden, just tucked away in the mountains. It was always waiting here for us.” Faith whispered the words softly, and he was back to watching the water and the thin curls of mist skirting over the water carrying along those flecks of light and that sickly sweet smell surrounding them now. “Can you imagine a world where its this peaceful all the time? Where the wildlife and the people exist in harmony and the earth is green again?” She prompted him to imagine it, and he really could. It was green and quiet, filled with the songs only nature could truly provide. He smiled a bit, nodding along in agreement with her. It did sound lovely, a blessing mankind probably didn’t deserve to be granted at this point. “That’s what the Father promises to us—the chance for rebirth and new growth and this wonderful unspoken peace.”

She hummed softly as she pulled away to float around him, trailing her fingers softly along him. She took a moment to press against his back, slipping her arms around him to hug him briefly before she again slipped away and back around him to sway softly. She lifted her hands up now, to cradle his face softly as she sighed sweetly—breathing those vapors gently into his face and he felt his body draw them in deeply. One hand trailed down, stopping over the key that hung around his neck. She pulled away and he felt a physical loss before she took his hands and led him along again. Towards the water. 

He followed along, eager to please as she started speaking again. “Think of all the good that will come. All things end, my dear aspiring hero…but from all things that end, new things blossom.” He got caught up in her tone, carried along with it willingly. He could understand that, he really could. All the good would honestly make up for the bad—it would just take a very long, unforgiving time to see that change. But the generations that survived could. “We should return the world to the earth, and this time build around it and cherish it. The rivers and mountains, even the trees should shape our land. And what we take, we should give back.” That really would solve a lot of things, and he knew he could abide by those rules. But why not make that change now?

They stopped walking again, and the sound of the water was louder now. He realized they were standing at the edge of it, the water lapping at the edges sandy banks dotted with pebbles made smooth by the river. He really wished he could feel the sands between his toes right now as he sighed deeply, appreciating the clean smell the breeze along the river brought to him. “Do you trust me?” Faith asked him as she stepped into the river before him now.

“Yes.” He answered, and he did. He could feel it, down in his bones, that right now he should trust her completely. She rewarded his answer with another soft smile, and she started singing softly to him. He couldn’t understand the words, in a language he didn’t know. It felt old though, and laced with a soft power of calm energy coursing through those new veins of his magic.

When she tugged gently at his wrists, he followed her into the river. He could feel the water soaking into his pants around his knees as they moved at a steady pace to where the deeper parts of the Henbane started. He realized she’d stopped singing, and he looked to her for her instructions. “All you need to do…is take a leap of faith.” 

As soon as she said the words, he dived forward. To his surprise she disappeared in front of him and he found himself falling through the air. He felt like the world slowed down, and he twisted back to see a bridge above him just before he was plunged into the cold water. _‘Oh fuck me, what the fuck?!’_ He quickly swam upwards, or what he hoped he perceived to be correctly as upwards. He wished he could give a sigh of relief as the light shimmering from the surface indicated that he was close. When he broke free, he took a deep breath of air and thanked every deity he could think of that this branch of the river was slow right here. 

He treaded water as he searched for the direction to swim in and started moving towards the closest stretch of land there was. He swam clumsily to the shore, panting as he dragged himself up onto the shore and spun around to lay on his back. There were sparks of lights in the corners of his eyes that started fading as he drank in the cool air around him. “What the Hell happened? Where’s John?” He whispered the questions to himself aloud as he stared at the sun now hidden behind thick clouds. 

That brand on his palm suddenly seared and he grasped it to his chest as he hissed. John flickered into existence beside him, his arms crossed and an expression of clear displeasure across his face. “I distinctly told you to stay on the trail, and yet here we are. Distinctly _not on the trail_.” He held out his hands now, and Sharky took a minute of eyeing them before he took them and let the other help him up. “What the hell happened?”

“Summarized in a sentence: I’m a fucking idiot. Long story, I got lost in the cadence of her voice and shit. Guess there is a downside to being so musically inclined after all. Who knew?” He answered as best he could, dropping his gaze away from the other’s in his own form of shame.

“I did. I knew.” John remarked, before sighing finally. “It’s fine. You’re fine. I’ve got what I need. Now let’s get you home, into dry clothes and warm—you’re shaking like a damn leaf in a stiff breeze.” He moved forward now, to offer him a shoulder for support. He took it eagerly, draping an arm across his shoulders as he was led up the bank to the road near the bridge he’d evidently jumped off of. He shivered at the thought, and he felt John pull him in against him closer in an attempt to warm him up—water rising up in wispy lines of steam where their skin touched. 

“Where are we?” Sharky asked as he glanced around, head still spinning and his sense of direction still scattered to the winds. 

“Not that far from your home, but too long a walk for you to make. So hold tight, and appreciate this.” The other’s answer caught him off guard, partially because he was pulled in against the other tightly. He clung to him in return as the world around them blinked out briefly, and they appeared back at the edge of the trailerpark. John was panting now, but even when he released him he insisted on helping him walk. 

He thought about what to say as they moved along, before he was talking past that attempt of a filter. “You didn’t tell me you could do that.”

John laughed in return now, shaking his head before casting a sideways glance to him. “You didn’t ask.”

“Fair enough.” He admitted that much before he truly took notice of the other breathing heavily and his ashen skin a touch greyer than usual. “Is it hard?” He was laughing again, as they closed in on the porch. He unhooked the keys from his belt loop and unlocked his door, thankful to be inside before he was being led to the bathroom.

“Quite. I can move myself in small spaces with ease, and if you summon me to your side it’s much the same. But teleporting myself and a human any distance further than I can immediately see is extensively draining. Don’t expect to see it often.” His words were smooth, understandable, and clear. But the world around them was becoming muddy and he groaned lowly. He lifted a hand to rub at his eyes as he stepped through the door, and John drifted away from him shortly before he heard the water being turned on. “You breathed in her magic…you need to warm up, and spend some time around a lot of steam to dissolve the effects.”

“So what is she?” He asked as he stripped the gear from him, followed shortly after by his hoodie and his shirt. He felt lighter afterwards, turning to watch the tub fill with steaming water. He needed to know that much, maybe he could understand how he was sucked under her spell so quickly. 

“A siren with dream magic…she lures you away, lowers your defenses, and can alter reality around you to a certain degree.” John answered, turning around to face him again. “Pants off. You can leave your underclothes on, as I am not about to leave your side until I know she’s out of your head.” There was a flood of embarrassment flooding through him, and he was just grateful he was even wearing boxers that day as he undid his belt and jeans. He stripped his boots off, grateful to be out of the fresh hell that was wet socks, before he let his pants drop. 

He climbed into the tub, lowering himself into the comforting warmth with a low sound of appreciation. “Thanks...for sticking around. Awkward as it is.” He stated, leaning his head back against the wall before he reached over and partially shut the shower curtain.

“It’s only awkward if you believe it is. Certain feelings are entirely subjective.” John responded, and he couldn’t help but laugh at that. 

“Is it like a demon thing to dismiss emotions?” He asked before sinking lower into the water, his eyes drooping again as he almost slipped under the call to rest. He fought it for now, in favor of the company he currently held.

“No, it’s a me thing.” He sounded amused, and he pried his eyes open to glance over. He could see him sitting on the floor, back resting against the wall as his tail twitched occasionally at his side. He smiled at that confirmed fact, that the other had settled in to stay just as he said. 

“Good to know.” He mumbled, and the demon turned to catch his eyes in concern at the soft tone.

“I said some feelings. I don’t dismiss them all, but I don’t believe they should hold you down. But a promise is a promise, and I said I’d help you. Which means I implied I would make sure you survive even the smallest of things.” John answered him again, keeping his voice level and even. “You know what to look for now. I’m not sure what your exchange consisted of, because she pulled you into her fog where I can’t see or hear you.”

“She’s not bad…” He started talking before he could think the words through, but he was smiling as he thought of her again. “She’s kind.”

“She’s a liar, Charlemagne.” The hissed tone was surprising in its bitterness, and he tuned to meet the other’s eyes. “You can’t believe her words, can’t believe the visions she shows you. She was a manipulator in life, it doesn’t surprise me in the slightest she’s one in her undeath.” He almost spat the words out as he turned away and settled back against the wall. “Don’t believe her, Sharky. Promise me that much, that’ll you’ll put those thoughts behind you right now.”

“Yeah, okay…” He answered the demon, the words heavy in his chest as he spoke them. “I promise I won’t believe her.” He already felt like he was lying, and he swallowed the feeling in his throat. _‘He knows more than I do, I need to listen. My gut ain’t always right.’_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woke up with heartburn, saw the wifi was working again, and jumped to post this before passing out. Hope you like it.


	5. No Mercy, No Remorse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another demon is confronted and understood, and a new ally is made. Definitely a step towards progress.

It hadn’t taken long to recover from Faith’s magic but he’d hung back near his trailer park regardless and ending up seated near his own radio in the living room. He sifted through the channels slowly, but as of now he wasn’t hearing anyone talking about strange sounds. He knew he could catch them from time to time, but people in the area were quick to name wildlife because ignorance truly was bliss. But for now, the silence meant everything was still contained.

After a while of quiet adjustment, settling back into his skin, he finally gave a defeated sigh. “So…this is all the way across the county. All of this bullshit hellfire that’s gonna rain down on us. And you can’t teleport long distances repeatedly…and I lack a running vehicle in any way currently.” Sharky pushed himself out of the arm chair to hunt through his pockets for a cigarette. A lit one was passed to him from the side, and he took it quickly before he began pacing. “It would be the deadbeat that’s gotta save the fucking world, wouldn’t it?”

“Have I mentioned how well you’ve handled this thus far?” The demon’s tone was that of light teasing, and he barked out a forced laugh as he puffed away at his cigarette and stopped his relentless pace to eye the demon floating in the air—his cane once more manifested and being tossed from hand to hand.

“Yeah, I know. You haven’t said it, but I know.” He responded, before he started up his pacing again. _‘Just keep moving’_ “Boshaw family tradition—outrun the bad feelings. It’s been working so far.”

“Sounds…stressful.” He could hear the amusement now, and it made him laugh in a bitter agreement. “And quite unhealthy, but I am not one to talk I suppose.” 

“That’s what the beer and the cigarettes are for. Look, right now ain’t the best time for some kind of psychological analysis on either of our parts.” He tripped over his feet as he stopped, stumbling a bit until he landed against a wall with less grace than he wanted. He let himself lean back against it as he took a deep breath. “Point is…we need to find a vehicle, so we can go poke more bears.”

“Okay, see, that’s more unhealthy than the outrunning thing.” John’s tone was quick as he popped himself over to float in front of Sharky. His blue eyes were stern as he lifted that lecturing finger of his again. “You just recovered from Faith, and you’re still new to magic and the other realms of reality they rule—"

“I’m fireproof, so they can fucking eat my shorts John. This entire thing is timed in so many ways. I know the radio’s clear now, but it’s only so long before a few people start talking and that puts us one step closer to full on panic throughout all of Hope County.” The surprise forming on the demon’s face was a reminder that no one thought he took anything seriously, that he didn’t have concerns about the outside world. But he did, and they were building up behind that dam he was always outrunning. And now some were spilling over. “Cause we already saw what the mist in the Henbane does now. It’s coming up on hunting season, we can’t let the Whitetails sit and brood. Hell, my cousin lives in those woods half the time. And let’s not forget damn near every damn landowner in this place owns their own arsenal of weapons that they’re ready to wield to defend their place.” He took a deep breath at the end of that, as the other floated down to stand in front of him. “It’s a powder keg waiting to take out the people that don’t have a way to fight for themselves and that’s too many to just overlook.”

“I understand where you’re coming from, but while I encourage the quest for knowledge so we can get a leg up we should still be smart about it. And charging in headfirst is never smart.” John kept a level and serious tone, and he honestly appreciated the gesture. “So slow down, take a breath, and think about what we need and how we can find it. Do you have anyone that would help you? Family, perhaps?” He moved forward and the other stepped out of his way to follow him into the kitchen once more.

He snorted at the thought before he started listing off his already sparse family that just got thinner as the years passed. “I’ve got an aunt and a cousin. My mom’s gone, my dad’s dead, and there’s an uncle that may as well be dead.”

“That’s still two people that can assist. It’s better than nothing. And if you find yourself anxious due to my ‘demony’ exterior—I can disguise myself to mortals, most demons can.” He pulled out a bottle, opening it and turning to look at his companion once more as he continued to speak. “Anyone that has had personal dealings with our realm can see a hidden demon for what they truly are—but the mortals around them have no clue.” The new information definitely helped ease up some of the anxiety he had building, but he was almost dumbfounded it hadn’t been revealed before this.

“Well…fuck…then what happened to Hurk? You said I wasn’t the only one that could see you and that he ran away.” He asked about his cousin midway through the acceptance, as his train of thought lurched into that topic he’d just dismissed two days ago. He narrowed his eyes bit, that sudden and daunting need to try and protect the other human sparking up in him. “What the fuck did you do?”

“Me? Nothing at all. I stayed in your room all night, forming our little pact and sealing the deals you started.” The genuine shock in the demon’s eyes conflicted with his dramatized mannerisms as he gestured to himself in mock offense. “When did I actually imply I appeared before him? I merely answered the questions you had floating rather loudly in your mind.” He huffed before he appeared on the counter, head tilting a bit as he watched the windows covered in paper behind them. “He saw something he wasn’t supposed to when he looked out the window after the sounds started up—the skittering on the roof, the tapping on the windows.”

“I guess you didn’t…” Sharky accepted the answer, before there was another lurch off the tracks on to something he had said. “Wait, so you can read my mind!”

The other smirked before he pushed himself down off the counter to grab a bag of chips behind him. “To an extent. But is that what you truly want to focus on?” He gave a hum as he moved to settle into one of the dining chairs again.

He’d gotten so caught up in just watching John move around the room he almost hadn’t realized he’d gotten derailed again. He snapped his fingers, putting himself back on track. “Right, fuck—he looked out the window?! You don’t look out the windows at night!”

“I am aware. But the skeptic never truly believes until they experience the supernatural firsthand.” His tone was so matter of fact, but he was chuckling as he found himself agreeing on several levels.

He sighed though, glancing over to the radio in the living room before letting himself settle into the chair opposite of John. “I need to check on him. Who knows what coulda followed him home…” So many things left that island that night, who even knows if this was one of those or something that hadn’t been tied to the island specifically.

“Most likely something quite minor that feeds on nightmares. That’s what most of Faith’s creatures do after all. They still had a form of free reign until she manifested fully, so it most likely wanted an easy meal.” The other had waved his cane about to grab his attention, before the creature nodded towards him. “Tell him to pay a visit to his witch friend.”

“How do you—” He started to question him before he was cut off quickly with another look of real offense and a raised hand.

“Do you think I wouldn’t know what stepped into my home? That was sage salt he used, those oils were rosemary-thyme blends, and those bowls were blessed in the autumn moonlight.” He lifted his fingers as he listed things, before letting his cane drop and disappear into smoke so he could lean forward over the table before gifting him with another cocky smirk. “There’s a different feel between each, but magic recognizes magic. And that magic was wielded by a witch.” He was smiling with the other at that, before he was breaking eye contact to awkwardly observe a section of wall to ignore the embarrassment painted on his face at the thoughts that followed. _‘He’s always so smug when he knows I can’t argue shit I don’t know. Why’s he gotta be so pretty when he is though?’_

When he looked back at him again, he received a wink and he jerked his gaze away in order to answer. “Huh. You really do know everything, don’t you?” They’d just had a talk about how he could read his mind—stop thinking stupid shit. He’d admitted there was an ‘extent’ to it, but he shouldn’t be taking those chances. 

He was thankful of the other laughing again, and he looked back to watch him open the bag of chips from earlier to offer him some. “You flatter me, but I assure you I do not…yet. Maybe pay a visit to them too, when the fight truly begins. Back on track now, who else can help?” Accepting a handful, he sighed deeply to consider his only other option beyond the cousin they just discussed.

“My aunt…she’s been helping me out a lot more after some family bullshit.” As soon as he said it, he smiled a little bit to himself. She’d been warmer to him lately, trying to support him now that he finally admitted to himself who he truly was. _‘Coming out was nothing compared to actual demons, Aunt Addy, I wish I could tell you.’_

“You now have three possible sources of assistance already. Does the weight on your shoulders feel lighter now, dear Atlas?” John’s voice snapped him out of his own trance again, and he smiled a bit at the nick name.

“Yeah…thanks.” He could barely breathe the words out before the other gave a look of disgust prior to waving a hand towards him as if dispersing smoke blown his way.

“Please do not mention it, and let’s keep moving forward. Where do we want to go next?” He chuckled a bit, before looking down and realizing he was still holding a cigarette that had gone out at some point. He dropped it onto the table as he thought about what they needed to. He needed to go check in on Hurk, but he’d have to get there first—and while his aunt will drive him quite a few places, she won’t drive him there. But she did have an extra truck he could borrow. He snapped his fingers now, looking to John with his own grin.

“To the Whitetails…I gotta go see my cousin, see if I can borrow his old camping gear. But first, I need to call on aunt Addy…because I do not have a vehicle to get there _yet.”_ The words became more confident as he continued speaking, damn near excited all over again when he reached the end of it.

He received laughter along with some light clapping. “There we go. Progress.” He met the other’s eyes as he accepted the almost praise, and again he felt that fluttering in his chest before squashing it back down.

After he made some lunch, he retrieved his radio and tuned into the Drubman Marina frequency and radioed out to his aunt. He was surprised when Xander answered, but the young man was quick to agree to let Sharky use his truck—and while he was at it, he’d bring it on over to him since the fog was too thick to walk it. And the other was true to his very enthusiastic word, only asking to be dropped back off where he came from. He gave the other a faint warning he had company before he stepped away from the radio to go get some things of his own together.

Before he knew it, he was already dropping his aunt’s boyfriend back off at the Marina before he was heading off to the Whitetails with a mildly stressed John attempting his best to appear composed in the passenger seat of the cab. When he asked if he was going to be alright, the demon merely mumbled something scathing about ‘infernal humans with their damn innovation’ followed by a rhetorical question of ‘weren’t horses good enough?’

He pulled up down the road, knowing better to enter the property—Hurk Sr. had a gun he wasn’t afraid to use on him—instead radioing in to his cousin’s frequency with his mundane request and his cousin carried the gear down to him. He climbed out of the truck to load the bags into the truck bed before he caught the other by his arm. “Hey, cuz. You need to get yourself on over to the person you got those ritual supplies from. You should—you know, come clean on losing those bowls.”

“Yeah, Sharky, I guess you’re right. Besides, maybe she’s got something that’ll help me stay asleep. I keep waking up with nightmares.” Hurk conceded sheepishly, before shrugging a bit and motioning to the company he hadn’t introduced in the cab of his truck. “Who’s that?”

“Oh, uh…name’s John. Met him in a bar last night…thought I might see where it goes, so we’re going camping.” He offered as it became his turn to look sheepish and break eye contact as he tried to lie to his best friend. The other merely gave a bit of a whoop before pulling him in for a hug.

“Shit yeah, cuz! I’ll let you get on your way then. I gotta head over to your neck of the woods to go see Callie about a spell and maybe some good weed if I ask nice enough.” Hurk pulled away before clapping a hand against his back between his shoulder blades, turning to leave as quickly as he arrived and drowning in even more questions than he’d arrived with. He decided to flee while his lying was still believable, only braving to glance at John in the seat beside him. The demon’s eyes were locked onto the trees on his side of the road as they moved along, and he realized the other’s twitching tail looked like a cat’s while it was hunting. He didn’t bother him, merely turned them towards the common camping grounds in the area.

He kept driving until John told him to stop, and he realized this was where the trees started thickening and the branches started to weave together a bit more. They weren’t blotting out the sky quite yet, but he knew the further in you went the darker it got. There was an unspoken rule to not go to the heart of these woods; it’d be too dark, too thick, too hard to breathe. Just staring into the center of the woods had his heart skipping the occasional beat and his breath seizing in his throat from time to time.

He pulled his eyes away and found a spot he could park the truck. He was glad to see John helping him grab things to carry as they made their way along a short trail to set up their camp around a fire pit someone had built and left behind. It was still daylight, but by the time they were done the sun had faded significantly. He knew anywhere else, he would have seen it setting large and red behind the mountains and the light would linger just a bit longer. But the canopy of both pines and oaks above them stole that light.

He got the fire going, tucking away their supplies into the tent as the last thing he needed to do before he settled down next to John on a log in the circle of light the fire offered them. Neither one of them said anything, but he knew they both felt the power shift between the day and the night. But he honestly had not been prepared for the waiting they would be doing—it was only when he was fed and caught up in quiet conversation that he felt something.

The jagged edges of fear were prickling at his edges immediately when he felt the bass of a low growl starting up somewhere behind him. There was no obvious sound yet, but the fear slowly pooling into his chest told him there was a predator near and it got him twitching and anxious. He realized he’d been patting his pockets only when a cigarette had been passed to him once more by John. The demon lit it absentmindedly, his own eyes fixed on the woods across from them. He tried looking that way, but the other ever so slightly shook his head before his tail swept around to point in another direction on the ground hidden by the fire pit in front of them.

He looked towards the new location, squinting to look out into the dark. He gasped after a second, noticing the crouching shadow at the edge of the treeline. He felt himself stiffening up before John whispered quietly to him. “Do. Not. Run.” As the words left the other in a hissed tone of silence, the form creeped closer like a stalking animal. It suddenly rose up onto its back legs as it moved to the edge in just into sight.

He knew who this was the moment he saw him—he looked just like his silhouette. Jacob was tall, taller than he was, and the scars along his arms danced in the glow of the campfire as his muscles twitched in what he understood was forced patience. That eagerness was evident in his wide, ice blue eyes trained intently on them. Splitting through the red hair that looked to be shaved on the sides were horns like tall spiraling splintered tree limbs. The branching additions added an unneeded height to make him feel more massive and looming than his hulking form already did. The next thing he was quick to notice was the blood staining his hands, darkest around his claws as well as the scarlet gristle and red painted around his mouth with tufts of fur stuck in his beard. He was grinning widely, showing off both set of large canines in his mouth freely. _‘That’s a helluva bite…’_

A large tail like a cougars swept around him now, the tip twitching and giving away that growing impatience as he continued to not acknowledge the new demon. His jaws fell open, and the low rumble in the air intensified. He swallowed softly, as he listened to it switch in patterns and tones until he realized he was mimicking predators. The guttural throaty sound of a wolf cornering its prey, the rumbling cry before the sharp hiss of a cougar defending its kill—the breathy panting of a bear as it runs up on you. He could feel every instinct in his body telling him to run, to flee, _to get away from the predator_ but yet he stayed frozen in stubborn fright. 

He finally eased out on the sounds, stalking closer yet. As he moved forward, the fresh scent of the pines melted away as the heavy iron scent flooded over him until it felt like pennies on the back of his tongue. Shortly after he adjusted to the scent of blood though, a new scent wafted towards them. The moldy smell of rot took over, churning his stomach quickly as a film settled over every surface in his mouth. He wanted a cigarette to fight the taste but he was stilled in his bones, afraid to so much as twitch to avoid drawing his attention even more. 

He could feel his muscles twitching and ready to run— _always ready to run, you coward._ He snarled at himself, angry at the sudden need to run. John turned to eye him now, before he hunted around for the cigarettes. After finding the object in question, he pulled one out and lifted it up in front of his face. Still afraid to move, he leaned in slightly to grasp it between his lips. He noticed John looking past him, and he pulled his gaze away completely to watch John make a point of snapping his fingers to form a tiny flame of light to offer him to light the cigarette. 

“You hold no power over that which you do not control.” John’s voice surprised him and he jumped when he heard it sound off beside him, but he subconsciously moved closer to the other as the brands on him suddenly felt magnetic. 

There was a new sound of low rumbling from Jacob he eventually realized was laughter that grated against his nerves. “On the contrary…I think he likes me.” He shivered at the words, and he felt his own demon’s hand on his shoulder as silent reassurance. A thought echoed through his mind persistent and loud. _‘No, no—I do not.’_ It was now he realized that ever turning his back on the other demon was another _bad idea._

“I banish you, Jacob…back to the heart of your woods. Fight your way out again.” He felt John move closer to him, and he watched him point a hand past him, before looking at his hand in confusion when nothing happened.

“You aren’t a witch, Johnny boy…and you know you can’t match me.” He turned around now at the sound of the other talking once more. The hulking shape regarded the smaller demon with something akin to amusement, before he looked past John to meet his eyes again. “Hey, human—shaking in your boots…I wanna tear you open, taste that sweet fear pumping in your veins…” He felt himself being drawn into that glowing pale blue gaze and his heart was fluttering in his throat once more. The demon grinned widely, jerking forward a bit as he gave a single word: “Run.” 

He wasn’t sure when he pushed his way off the back of the log, but he was up and running before he could stop himself. He heard John shout to go to the truck, but when he turned to bolt to it Jacob was in his path. The demon’s chest was heaving now, his excitement making him move quicker than expected. So he turned and charged off into the trees.

As he tried his best to duck and weave through the thick trunks of the trees, he could hear the crashing of a pursuing animal on his heels. He had no time for thoughts as he moved purely on that flight response—the word _‘COWARD’_ repeating like his pulse through his mind—as he dodged what he perceived to be gaping jaws snapping just behind his ear. His lungs burned as he found a new speed in him, eyes continuously looking for safety as his heart pounded hard against his ribs. He groaned in almost pain before he tripped over a branch and into a clearing. 

He spun around the skitter backwards on his hands before light flooded the trees behind him. He felt someone grabbing him by his hood and hauling him to his feet, and he flailed about in attempt to fight off the demon he’d been fleeing. 

“Hey, hey, HEY!” The voice speaking to him was vastly different, a slow draw he fond weirdly soothing. He regained his footing, spinning around to look at the source of this new source of calm around his ragged breathing. “Settle down, boy! What the hell are you doing running around these woods at night like a damn deer in flight this close to hunting season? It’s a good way to get yourself shot.” The man standing in front of him was blocked by the flood lights set up behind him. The man eyed the trees behind them before motioning with a jaw jerk to the area behind the lights— _safety._

He followed to that safe haven, taking the few steps into a blissful ring of light that wasn’t blinding him. His savior was decked out in camouflaged gear, wild hair barely brushed away from his face and almost blending into the equally wild and bushy beard. He held a hunting rifle in his hands, leveled to the ground while he still faced the trees. “Well, why were you running through the woods?”

He felt the need to run leaving him, and he finally found his voice. “I was camping…thought I heard something. Something big, like a cougar. Guess it was deer.”

“You don’t run from cougars—you don’t run from predators. And it wasn’t a deer, because it was on your tail before I threw those lights on.” The stranger argued, lifting his weapon when he heard the cracking of branches behind them. “And whatever that was, it wasn’t a cougar. I’ve lived in these woods for a long time now, and I know when a new predator moves in. And this…this ain’t no animal.”

Sharky’s jaw dropped, completely unprepared to talk to someone who suspected something otherworldly immediately. “Who _are_ you?” He asked without thinking, flinching a bit when the other pulled his attention away from the trees and back to him.

“Eli Palmer,” he provided with a curt tone, before he nodded to him. “And you are?” 

“Uh…Charlemagne. Boshaw.” He stuttered out his name, flushing a bit when a look of realization settled over the other at the received name.

“You’re the one that almost burnt down—”

Sharky cut him off before he could finish, dropping his gaze again. “Yeah yeah, I’ve almost burnt down a lot of things.” He hissed suddenly as his palm seared again and he remembered that at least one demon was stuck looking for him again. He squeezed his hand, hoping the other would know he was safe before he looked to Eli again. “Look, you seem like a guy that knows a lot about bullshit…how about I tell you what I know if you tell me what you do…and then maybe give me a lift or at least an escort back to my camp?”

Eli eyed him again very carefully, before sighing finally. “If we’re doing a lot of talking, let’s go back to my bunker. Can’t drop your guard for very long out here anymore.” He clicked the safety back in place on his rifle before slinging it around him on the strap. He realized the flood lights from earlier were mounted on the top of a very beat up old truck. “Whatever it is…it doesn’t like light.”

“Good to know…” He muttered before he joined the other in the safety of the vehicle. He closed his eyes at some point, leaning forward in his seat to give the impression he was praying as he tried to communicate to his own demon now. _‘I’m safe, and I may know more stuff soon. I’ll be back to the camp soon.’_

He was met immediately with a thought being forced into his head while his hand burned. _‘You goddamn better be. We need to have a serious talk on how you can’t seem to follow any instructions.’_

He laughed quietly to himself at the response before realizing that his savior was now eyeing him curiously. “Look, man, this isn’t how I thought this night was gonna go. I was just trying to camp in the damn woods…” The other gave a grunt of understanding as a response, and he let himself trail off and watch the trees—specifically the figure he could see running along the road and darting through the shadows, still taunting him as he fled completely from it now.


	6. The World Burns but Still We Breathe.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Little confessions that strengthen growing bonds...love letters almost, whispered in shadows.

He was settled on a couch, across from an old TV on a tired little entertainment system. He was almost surprised he was in the ground, and he hadn’t seen the full extent of the bunker but he knew it was pretty expansive. Maps were tacked to walls, smaller papers that looked like notes pinned up and strung with different color strings. He couldn’t read the writing here, but if he had to guess…notes on hunters that frequent the area, locations of predators to avoid, landmarks that could spell disaster if you didn’t expect them—all things helpful to know in this area. But he had no idea if he was right, but so far Eli didn’t seem like a nut. _‘Just some guy living in the woods, in a bunker…notes all over the walls…fuck he’s a doomsday prepper, isn’t he? This is how it always looks in the movies, though gotta admit this place is cozier than you’d expect.’_

Speaking of, the other man floated into his peripheral with an offered bottle of water. He hummed in consideration before reaching out and taking the cool bottle. “So…how open minded are you exactly, Eli?” He opened the bottle, sipping on at it while he waited.

“I’ve been preparing for the end of times for a while now. Have to say while I don’t believe everything, I’d be willing to believe what you have to say on the creature that’s moved into _my woods._ ” He hadn’t been expecting him to answer as quickly as he did, but Eli’s voice held no hesitation as he leaned against the wall across from him. “It moves on all fours but sometimes it stands up on two, it smells like death, and it can mimic other predators. Two nights now, and both of them its come creeping up on me in the dark.” His tone of matter-of-fact and he accepted them quickly for his tone alone. “Not to mention the animals in the area are acting up—the deer are extra flighty, bears straight up moving caves, bull moose crashing through the trees _away_ from something. Nothing about this is natural so already I’m willing to listen to some idiot I found running through the trees tell me about something I probably already know more about because maybe you’ve got some clue I’m missing about this new apex predator.” The last bit had started with him counting off on his fingers before he threw his hands up in the air with a frustration that _almost_ made the gesture humorous. 

“Would you believe…demons?” Sharky asked quietly, stalling as long as he could before saying the last word.

“I’d believe it quicker than I’d believe it was some rich fuck’s escaped pet. Are you saying it’s a demon?” The acceptance and then the question shocked him, and when he looked up at the other he quickly blurted out a confirmation.

“I am.”

Eli nodded after a minute, before pushing himself off the wall. “Then why is it _here?”_

“Well, one’s here. There’s another in the Henbane and one in Holland Valley.” The additional information had him giving those nervous giggles that he was quickly trying to swallow back down. Not everyone could understand that odd little habit of his.

“And why are _they here?”_ The tone of his words was still patient, still waiting and still understanding. _‘How are we having this conversation so easily?’_

“Remember that doomsday cult on the island way back?” He waited until he got some kind of indication that the other knew what he was talking about and the other man finally gave a minuscule nod. “Okay, so you know that much and to make a long story short—and so we aren’t pointing any fingers here—the wards got lifted and now they want to finish what they started.”

“Which was bringing the apocalypse, if I’m remembering my history right.” Eli’s voice was level, and when he met his eyes Sharky watched him nod across the room to a bookcase. “I read a lot.”

“I believe it. So point was, I was out in the woods trying to see what I was dealing with here.” He answered quietly and as honestly as he could for now.

“Reconnaissance, I get it. Makes sense.” A solemn nod, possibly of approval, before he asked another question. “And what did you learn?”

He gave a harsh laugh, before dropping his gaze back down to the ground. “That I shoulda talked to you first.” He had also learned he was a coward, that he ran from danger— _maybe I can’t do this after all._

There was a short laugh from Eli before he started speaking again. “Yeah, probably. Lots of folks to talk to out here that live in these woods. Most of ‘em are probably writing it off as something they can explain away though. I could start asking about predators in the area, I’m sure lots of folks would appreciate someone taking care of it for them so they’ll talk more.” 

That got him to jerk his gaze back up to watch him as he moved over to one of the large maps on the wall. “Wait, _you_ could?” Was he offering to help, to be an ally? He honestly did need more of those. 

“I live here, so yes, _I_ could. This is my home and I will protect it. I’m not handling the things in the other regions though—that information is yours to collect. But I suggest doing the same thing. Find something they could explain it with, and ask about it.” The response was given without looking away from his map, as he looked over the notes pinned in places before he lowered his gaze and tapped one of the pieces of paper over the Holland Valley region. “Speaking of things in other regions…you been tuning in to Zip Kupka’s frequency?”

A bizarre question that had him laughing and shaking his head. “No…I tend to avoid Zip on account of him being—” He was cut off quickly, and he met Eli’s gaze and caught the knowing smile he held in place.

“Nuttier than squirrel heaven? Yeah, he is, but the shit he’s been saying the last couple of nights have strayed away from the _usual_ government conspiracy crap to the lights in the evening sky, talking about some kind of sighting of an angel.” There was contained laughter mingling with his words before it faded away into his what he was assuming was his usual serious tone.

“Fuck…that’s not an angel.” He murmured the words quietly as realization set in. _‘Of course Zip would fucking see them.’_

“Yeah, I figured as much. At first I thought he just got into some bad whiskey, but in light of this revelation…I think it might be worth checking out.” Eli asked, moving away from the map to his own radio.

“You mind turning it on? Let’s see if he’s saying anything now.” He was asking the question while the other already began setting up the system, twisting the dial to shuffle through the silent channels.

“Oh he’s always saying something, you just gotta wade through it to find what you’re looking for.” He laughed quietly as he found what he was looking for, before quickly turning it up so they could both hear. Sharky stood up to move over beside him just as Zip’s voice filled the room.

_“—you hear that? It’s back again, the singing from the trees…I can see lights in the woods, and there’s smoke on the breeze. The Angel is back and he knows I’m onto them—I see the truth and they’re trying to silence me! Trying to keep me from telling you! Don’t fall for their words! Don’t fall for his lies! They’re not really there, just holograms set in place by the government to scare you off the track to pure fucking enlightenment—”_

“Well, guess that answers that…” He sighed quietly as he spoke, looking over to meet the other’s more amused smirk.

“Goddamn, he’s like the best damn radio show that airs only half the time.” Eli was grinning, before he turned to look at him again. 

That had him laughing quietly as well, shaking his head a bit. “I think he lives in a liminal space—time don’t mean the same thing to him as it does to us.” 

The wild man gave another laugh, shaking his head a bit. “That would actually explain quite a bit. Point is…I’d check out what he has to say. Now let’s get you back to your camp site and pack you up.” He reached over and switched off the radio again, escorting Sharky back out of his bunker and to the truck once more. He worked very hard to pretend he didn’t hear those growls taunting him from the edge of the woods. Climbing into the cab of the truck, he chose to rub at the spiral brand once more as it started to thud with a dull ache. It must be the prolonged distance from his own demon; he had to admit he felt eager to be back to him, but he wasn’t sure if it was due to the tie they shared or a disillusioned attachment. _'Holy shit, did my vocab increase when we linked minds…or was that even my own thought?’_

That concept—that it wasn’t even his own thought—opened up a host of new questions. Was he the only one with those fluttering butterflies in his chest at moments? Did the other feel as closely tied to him or is that just the summoning bond or the deal they made? Would he leave when this was all done? _‘Could I go with him—would I even go with him? Will I still be human? Fuck—I forgot about that part…’_ He got lost in those thoughts, trying his best not to spiral into a panic as he rode in silence back to his campsite. Eli helped him pack up, all the while he was desperately trying to contain his spreading thoughts and corral his breathing once more. He was waving the other off before hoping into his own borrowed vehicle and driving away.

He let himself just drive, checking the gas before he thoughtlessly drove in a direction opposite of his own home. It was a good long minute before John materialized in the seat beside him when he stopped to pull onto the main road. He could feel him closer than he needed to be and his pulse spiked when the other spoke. “You’re panicking.”

“No I’m not.” The denial was quick, and he was stubborn—jumping to the defense stronger than he needed to. He gave a mock laugh before glancing over at the other. Those damned eyes of his were trained on him, and he thought he could see concern. Or maybe he was projecting. “I’m fucking peachy. Took a jog in the woods, made a new friend. Got a new lead.” He gripped the steering wheel a little tighter despite the grin he was forcing to his lips. “It’s all a part of my big plan John, you just don’t know it yet.”

There was a soft sound of amusement before he felt the other reach over to touch his arm. “I have a hard time believing you when I can feel your pulse from here.” He could hear the humor he meant to convey, his attempt to calm him down. But instead the vision of Jacob’s snarling grin stained in red flashed into his head, and he was shaking his head quickly.

“Let’s not talk about my pulse. Or my blood…or my insides. You get the idea.” As he spoke, he subconsciously sped the car up. He could feel the demon pressing closer to him, and he could almost feel the other’s breath hitch at the action through the other that was sitting so infuriatingly close. The proximity added confusion into the fear and his own chest started to constrict.

“I can do that, but do you think you can pull this metal death trap over?” The voice was trying to hold steady, but the flighty rhythm of it betrayed him more than words ever could. “Seems like a bad idea to be piloting this thing in your current condition.” He frowned at that, stubbornly speeding a bit more as he kept his eyes on the road.

“This is my ‘current condition’ ninety percent of the time John, I just look damn good when I’m having an anxiety attack alright?” The hand on his arm was clenching tight to the sleeve of his sweatshirt—he burst into nervous laughter at the thought of how it might actually calm him down if he could feel the other’s actual touch on his skin. _‘What does that even mean? Why does it fucking matter in the grand scheme of possibly dying all the time?’_

“That doesn’t make me feel better in the slightest Charlemagne.” The voice was different, and so was the tone—but the phrase echoed in his head as if he heard that piece of shit speaking it again instead of John. It reminded him how much he could hate that name. But he swallowed down the growl of anger and resentment forming when he glanced to John and saw the other’s gaze fixed steadily on the floorboard.

“My name is fucking Sharky! And goddamn it!” He couldn’t stop himself from shouting, flinching as it reverberated in the cab around him. The demon at his side stiffened suddenly, and he felt his stomach drop in a sort of defeat as pity won out. He slowed down, pulling off the road again before they crossed the county line. “Fine. What is it?” He chose to focus on his surroundings, recognizing the sign welcoming you to the Valley.

It took a few moments before he heard the other’s voice—slow and smooth, like water over stones. “Take a deep breath.” He felt a sudden relief wash over him as he shifted the truck officially into park and leaned back in his seat. “Alright…do you want to talk about what happened?” He brought his hands up over his face, pushing the cap off his head and rubbing at his eyes. When he finally let himself look at John, he found the other’s gaze intent on his face. He felt his face flushing as words flooded from his lips.

“Yes. No. Not right now, and that’s not what this is about I promise. Well, it’s definitely part of it but its kind of all of it at once mostly. Causing and stopping the apocalypse, being hunted by a demon, jumping off a bridge I didn’t even see coming, oh and hey—I may not even be human by the end of this so the few things I have accomplished won’t mean shit. But you wanna know what’s the stupidest part of this whole thing?” He was laughing again, but this time it was deep and full of that hatred he only ever could aim towards himself. “As much as that freaks me out, what flipped the switch was wondering what happens when this is done. I’ll be a hero and not only will no one know, I’ll be different and I won’t be able to explain it to anyone that cares. Not that that’s a big number either mind you, but that’s a rant for another day.” Giving a deep sigh, glancing down briefly to where he could feel his fingers toying with the strings of his hood, he pushed himself to finish his thoughts. “Point is…when this is done, and if I’m not human…why should I stay? Why should you?” _‘Spit it out, be a fuckin man.’_

Silence filled the space between them but before it could become truly suffocating John broke it with the most humble tone he’d ever heard from the demon. “You…care if I stay?” He met his eyes again and he could see him eyeing him carefully—like he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing.

As he spoke, he felt himself realizing how obvious it felt. He was almost embarrassed by how long it took him to realize he was already attached. _‘I always was clingy.’_ “Well…yeah. I don’t have anyone. My cousin is my best friend but he travels a lot, my Aunt only really started being what you’d call family when I came out, and speaking of coming out—my uncle disowned me. We already covered my folks—my mom left years ago and my dad died shortly before. Even as close as I am to Hurk, I’ve spent more time with you sober than I have ever spent with him. Hell, you can see in my head. That trips me out. You can see into my thoughts and you know the truth—you know that’s a war zone in and of itself. I’m scared half the time of shit that isn’t even real, and I drag myself through imagined scenarios that stress me out that’ll never happen because I’m a fucking hermit with zero social skills with an active imagination. High school drop out means leaving here would be harder to accomplish I know that but if you go…I don’t think I can stay.” By the end he could feel the truth coursing through his veins like the magic he kept forgetting to wield. It felt natural to just spill his guts to him, and he flushed once more at the final confession. _‘Is this some pathetic one-sided love story starting? Fuck, why did I think that—if he wants to he can hear me.’_

The laugh he received eased some of those fluttering nerves again, distracted by the way it mimicked his own from earlier. “Why not? I’m nothing to you, just a set of strange circumstances. I’m nothing.” He knew the other believed that, and he could see himself reflected in the other once more. “I was a cultist in life—I am a demon in death. And I have never been a good man in the slightest no matter what realm I’m in. Why would you follow me?” Those glowing frosted eyes were back on him again, still as a statue now that he was finished with the wild gestures he was making. 

“I don’t know.” More honesty, and the vagueness in it made him wince as well. _‘Because you’re the closest I’ve had to a friend outside of blood and a sense of duty.’_ “And I hate that answer because it’s bullshit but I really don’t know.” He sighed, dropping his gaze again in shame. _‘Because maybe this could be something more, and I’d be willing to pretend to stay near you.’_ It sounds so pathetic, don’t say it out loud. “Cause that’s what friends are supposed to do. That’s what they do in the movies anyway. They stick together.”

“Are we friends?” That same inquiring tone, laced with disbelief as he tilted his head in mild amusement.

“I want to be.” The admission surprised him, but he nodded finally before giving that harsh attempt at a laugh to break the tension he could feel building. “Sounds pathetic out loud don’t it? _I just really want to be your friend, I’d be willing to follow you into Hell itself.”_ He used a mocking tone as he stressed the poorly altered thought from seconds ago. “How are you supposed to make friends and not have a damn heart attack every time?” That was information he could have used years ago, but now was better than never. Maybe he just needed someone who knew what it felt like to hate yourself this much.

“Alas, another thing I lack an answer to because while my silver tongue can open many doors…” The other laughed earnestly, before shaking his heading and sighing a bit as well. Slowly as he spoke, his gaze turned towards that county line. “I didn’t have friends. I had something resembling family but it never truly was. And in death…I admittedly never thought of it. I didn’t think myself worthy. Can we…can we discuss this somewhere other than here? I really do not like this horseless carriage.” There was a flash through his own veins, some instinct that told him it was also the place they were in he didn’t like.

He hadn’t realized he’d been leaning against the other until he had to sit back up to reverse and pull back onto the road. “Yeah…yeah, lets get back.” John settled back in the seat closest to him again, and he appreciated the close proximity more than he’d ever be brave enough to admit. 

“Thank you.” He tried to ignore the tugging at his insides as they drove back into the Whitetails. “But yes…I suppose we’re friends. If that’s what you wish. Can I ask another question?” He glanced up at the rearview mirror to catch the silhouette of a humanoid figure with four large feathered wings hovering right at the border of the county as they drove away.

He cleared his throat, before nodding finally. “Shoot, shorty. I’ll answer if I can.”

The hesitant tone caught him off guard, used to the confidence the other was always cloaking himself in. “…what exactly does the phrase ‘came out’ mean?”

He was almost stunned into a silence. _Almost._ “Ah, well. Fuck, I wasn’t expecting that one.” He kept forgetting the other wasn’t quite as experienced in the world as he wanted the world to think he was. Not yet, anyway. But pushing that aside, he was quick to stumble through an explanation. “I uh…I admitted to the world, and to myself, that I like men and women both. In like…the more-than-friends sense.”

“There’s a common phrase for that now? And its only two words?” John responded, quick to understand a lot when given the right cues. _‘Like the world’s a damn puzzle, and he’s always waiting for the right clues. He’ll never be helpless.’_ “I’m fairly jealous, but I thought as much, I suppose. Instinct if you will.” And there he was again, quick to confidence and a smooth southern charm that had him grinning again. He felt the mood lightening more, and he was glad to receive the gift that was this part of him.

“And what was it when you were alive?” He almost couldn’t believe he could ever ask that question and not sound suspiciously crazy for a pyromaniac that lived in an abandoned trailer park turned trash manor. 

There was another harsh laugh from the demon, before he felt the other turning in his seat to slide down and rest with his back against his side. “Beyond grounds for murder without prejudice?” Before he could offer, the other was lighting a cigarette. He took a drag off of it before lifting it up for him to snag between his lips while he drove. _“The love of which you do not speak.”_ The phrase was hissed out, and he could see his tail twitching in the corner of his vision.

“That’s a mouthful.” He responded, grinning when he received a muttered reply of ‘Tell me about it.’ He cleared his throat after a minute, before forcing a question out to sate his curiosity. “So…um…how about you?”

“What about me?”

“I mean…did you have _‘the love of which you do not speak’?”_ He froze after a second, before words started babbling from him again—‘I’m sorry, you don’t have to answer that’—before he was interrupted once more.

“Yes. Its part of why I was so entrenched in Eden’s Gate.” There was a heavy honesty to his words as he lit another cigarette for himself. “No one judged you on the island. No one threatened your life for being abnormal in that sense.”

“Its not abnormal though. Its pretty much natural.” He knew this wasn’t just for John, it was still in its own twisted part for him. Just because he admitted it didn’t mean he didn’t struggle with it—he had to rewrite a large portion of his own memories and he was still coming to terms with them slowly. That every part of him that made up his soul was as beautiful as that aurora John had showed him. “Scientists are finding it in animals more and more, and we’re just advanced animals right? That means its natural.” The continued defense was mumbled, the other humming loudly as he nodded to himself.

“I agree, Sharky. But this is a new era I haven’t been able to explore enough to understand that level of acceptance in full yet.” As John started to speak, he felt a sort of reverence in the moment. “But…I am glad to hear I am not alone. I’ve spent far too much of my time isolated because of it. My father almost beat me to death as a child when he learned I kissed the neighbor boy on the cheek. My brothers attempted to protect me, but they couldn’t shield me their entire lives…so there were still moments where I had no security. I couldn’t even tell you what they looked like now.” Maybe he felt the need to make them even for his confession earlier, or maybe he just needed to talk—but he’d never interrupt him. And he most definitely didn’t doubt him. “Eventually…I was left at an orphanage with no explanation, and when the family that adopted me learned of the condition that earned me a spot in that Hell…well they decided they too would try to beat it out of me. But they never could remove that part of me from my being, despite the daily attempt to do just that. I didn’t shed a tear when they died in that house fire. Such mysterious circumstances, that tragedy. Quite a loss.” The sarcastic tone didn’t slip past him and he had a fairly good idea on who started the fire. 

“But then Joseph found me…brought me to the island, told me I wasn’t flawed or ruined or possessed by some unholy spirit. I was just…human. Like the rest of his followers—human, beaten and broken before being betrayed by the world. And it was…” He kept talking, and for a moment the other almost softened beside him in his memories. “…it was so wonderful to feel accepted that I overlooked everything else. All the red flags that sprouted up over time—the pyres and those unwilling sacrifices, the baptisms I was tasked with taking over when he drowned someone during a vision...the Faith’s he would just casually replace if they spoke out of turn.” He shivered after a minute as he seemed to snap out of that blissful haze of nostalgia, before puffing at his cigarette with a solemn expression. “He was cruel, but he hid it so well behind kindness you could never see it. Rose tinted lens will do that to you.”

“Fuck, man…I’m sorry. That shit sounds straight fucking awful.” He felt the need to offer comfort to the other, as he let himself start to believe in a possible future where they could exist together. Pretending to be human, pretending to live however they chose—in this realm or the other. “Times have changed, the world is more understanding. Not everywhere just yet—my uncle threatened to shoot me when he found out, then just chased me off his property. That’s why I had my cousin meet me earlier…couldn’t trust the old bastard not to try something…and I didn’t trust myself not to retaliate.” Another confession slipped past his gates, and he knew that anger burning deep in him was real. It was usually reserved for himself, but he had a single exception as of right now.

The other picked up on it quick, twisting a bit to look up at him and he risked a glance to him to catch the smirk across his face. “Wrath is an interesting thing isn’t it? Almost takes on a life of its own at times, manifesting in daydreams of violence and self loathing fits.” The demon was wise beyond his years but no doubt didn’t believe that. “I tried carving it out of me so many times, and all I did was scar myself again and again and ruin good clothes with the blood that flowed so freely.” He gave another confession, and his mind flashed to the scars hidden among the tattoos on his arms.

But he wasn’t comfortable with how he spoke about himself before, how he thought less of himself no matter where in his own timeline they were discussing him. “You know…you keep saying you’re not human.” The words slipped out, and he found himself running through the right words to bullshit the rest of that unfinished thought. “But I think you’re humanity is still in there. They couldn’t take it from you. Think that makes you the strongest motherfucker I ever met.” 

“A demon with morals…a disgrace even in death.” John was laughing again, like he’d been told the world’s greatest joke and that had him frowning in frustration again.

“No, shut up real fast.” He snapped at the other and he could feel the heated glare the other gave him. “Sorry for telling you to shut up…how about listen?” He tried to soften his tone again, trying to offer the same comfort the demon had given him just moments ago. “You’re not a disgrace. You’re strong, smart as all Hell, and pretty damn easy to talk to. But most of all…you’re not alone. I’m here and I won’t go anywhere.” They crossed out of the Whitetails county and back into the Henbane. He felt the prickling at the edges of his sense immediate lift away from his shoulders and he took a deep breath.

“For now.” He almost didn’t catch the whispered words, but he nudged at the other’s back softly.

“Nah…forever man. When this is done…I’m going with you. We should see the world— _you_ should see the world.” He smiled at the thought of maybe traveling with the other anywhere he wanted to go. “The way it is now, I mean.” Show him how accepting the world can be when ignorance is lifted away from it layer by layer.

“I’d…I’d like that. Thank you.” The gratitude in his words was refreshing in some sense. And he didn’t turn to look at the other full on until he had to stop at junction to head towards home for them.

“Anytime, homie. We’re ride or die.” He answered, and the other looked at him in a sort of endeared confusion. He wasn’t sure what that meant, but through context clues he must have known it was sappy. “Let’s watch a movie when we get home. Could use a minute to shut off the world while I can afford to.”

“I agree with the sentiment. As long as there’s food. I’ll cook if need be.” John agreed, settling back into the lounging position he’d been in before.

“As a demon, do you even need to eat?” The question had been nagging him for a while, and he asked it as he found them making their way down the long stretch of road that brought you to the drive of Moonflower Trailer Park.

“No, but I like to.” The demon informed him, and he laughed before nodding.

“Good to know.” He answered, before letting themselves fall into a comfortable silence as they pulled up into the drive. John helped him unload the camping gear before they migrated back inside to let the radio play quietly in the back of the room as they set up for a night of movies and talking about things they decided to entrust with the other.

He didn’t try to squash out those fluttering butterflies stirring restlessly inside of him this time. Instead, for just a moment, he just let himself float away with them. For just this once—he’d let himself be happy in some pretend world. At least this one was pleasant.


	7. Sweet Dreams are Made of These...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John goes with Sharky to confront a piece of his past, and in turn their bond strengthens yet again.

John woke up spread out on the couch, and it took a minute to register the breathing form nestled against his back. He sat up, turning to find Sharky leaning back as best as he could in a sitting position on the couch. It’d been centuries since he felt comfortable enough to actually fall asleep. As a demon, that was another thing he didn’t really need to do. He was technically dead, but he’d found it didn’t stop him from doing certain things. He could sleep, but he couldn’t dream—but the link he shared with this mortal let him catch glimpses. And it let him pretend he was alive again. 

He let himself hover up to his feet before he lifted the human enough to settle him on the couch where he’d been. He smiled at the thought of the other not attempting to disturb him the night before. Another thing he’d yet to confess. _‘I like that you keep humanizing me instinctively. It’s a change, Sharky. Keep it up.’_ He hummed before he placed a blanket over him, before snagging the infamous green sweatshirt the other had pulled off the night before. He was almost always cold now, even with fire flowing quite literally through his veins; he recited the excuse as he pulled it on and pulled the cigarettes from the pocket as he stepped outside and closed the door behind him.

He was quickly suspicious of the green mist rolling into the center of the ring of buildings. He could see lights sparking in the deep mesmerizing colors, hear singing carried on the wind. He was confident in his own abilities, and he wasn’t scared of Faith. “Well come on now, were you always this wrapped up in the showmanship?” He called out, challenging the form he knew would be lingering close by.

“Oh, John…always so quick to the pulse.” Her voice echoed back to him softly, as the mist slowly pulled together before it materialized into the shape of her. She tilted her head a bit before she lifted a finger to the corner of her smile in an act of innocence. “You were always my favorite, Big Brother.”

“Shut your damn mouth, liar. I’m not your brother.” He growled the words out as he pulled a cigarette out from the pack, not moving beyond the porch was he frowned deeply back at her.

“No…no, you’re not.” She still sounded chipper as she spun in a slow twirl, dancing her way closer to the steps. He opened his hand as he stepped down the steps, his cane materializing before he slammed the tip to the ground and a line of fire burst into life. _‘Not a step further, you harpy.’_ She slowed down, giving her best expression of sorrow at the gesture. “You’re still my blood though. But I bet that human you’re keeping to yourself doesn’t know that; he’s so sweet, so trusting…”

“And he’s not yours.” He growled out again, leaning over the flames licking silently as his own magic commanded them to. 

Faith was quick to smile, leaning towards him still as the mist surrounding her sizzled into steam in the air between them. “There’s that denial again. No, he’s not mine. Not yet…but that’s not why I’m here.” Her words were teasing as she stood back up, swaying softly from side to side as she sang out her words in a mocking tone. “The Father knows you’re back.”

“Of course he does.” He was visibly seething before he could stop himself, but he turned to eye her as a frown creased his features. He lit the cigarette as he gave into his own foolish curiosity. “Why are you telling me?”

“So that maybe you’ll see the Truth. I can’t tell you what yours is but I am quite curious—you’ve always been too good at hiding your thoughts.” There was genuine interest in her own blue eyes—sunlight through the surface of the Henbane itself. But she was still teasing him, still holding some form of truth back and to herself. She could never be straight forward, and to prove the point she spoke again as her smile spread widely and unnaturally. “But I know what mine is, its always been unavoidable. Not all of us were strong enough to break our ties.”

He huffed at that, finally leaning back to light his cigarette. “I still died before you did.” He didn’t move from his spot as sentry though, even when she twisted away like dandelion puff on a breeze.

“Do with this as you wish; Father Joseph is already in control—he was always the strongest.” The closest she was to honest, he still wondered what her end game was. Was she just here to remind him she remembers? “And please…bring your human into my mist again soon.”

“Be gone with yourself!” He gave a quick snarl of defiance, snapping the words out as he bared his fangs. She merely lifted a hand to her mouth, giggling behind it tauntingly.

“So defensive about that sweet fool…I’ll have to keep an eye on that…” She whispered her promise of a threat before that mist once more dissolved, rolling out of the clearing as slowly as it arrived. He growled lowly as he pondered what that had meant, and if she had brought herself or if she’d been told to deliver the message from Joseph himself. But she’d been right on the nose about one thing; he was their blood, and he hadn’t admitted that to Sharky yet. He still hated the knowledge himself, as it always led back to overly complicated emotions still lingering in his chest.

He dissipated the flames before he found himself sitting on those steps. He finished his cigarette, staring off into the giant hand built fire pit where he’d trained Sharky a few days ago. While it was frustrating that he kept forgetting his powers, he supposed it made sense. If you’d gone your whole life not knowing you could breathe underwater, you’d still panic every time your head went below the water. He had a feeling if it came right down to it, the other would remember when the circumstances were dire. He was inexperienced, not stupid. _‘Why am I defending him to myself?’_ He realized it was because he was anxious because the next place they had to go was the one confrontation he was truly bothered by. He wasn’t sure if he was strong enough to face off with the self appointed voice of God. He sat out there for a long time that passed the life of his cigarette. He eventually went back inside, wrapping his arms around himself as he headed to the kitchen to find food to make.

A lot of this technology was throwing him off, but a few things he had figured out just by watching the human move about his home. He suspected it would only take him a couple years to catch up, but he wasn’t sure how long it would be before he could get used to those vehicles as his human had referred to them. He ended up scrambling some eggs and frying some bacon he’d found, like he’d watched the other do. The smell of the latter eventually had the mound on the couch stirring and he smiled softly at the thought of company. He did actually enjoy the other’s company, even with all the questions that came with him. Though he’d learned he could ask questions in return, and that sent them off onto side quests of knowledge for both of them. And he liked that—he also rather liked the idea of being able to do that with him for the rest of their existences. _‘I can’t let him die, not yet. Not until he’s demon enough he’d survive it. I want him to stay near me for as long as possible.’_

“How is it you know how to cook?” Sharky asked the question as he came over to lean against the counter near him. He smiled at the mundane question, reveling in the homey feeling the other always brought to him. _‘Always…as if I’ve known you for years, you strange man.’_ He looked up to the other, smirking a bit before he finally gave an answer.

“I used to cook for the cult. Large masses of food, but I got tired of everything being so bland I took over when I could.” He hummed a bit as he went to retrieve plates, before pointing silently to the tiny dining table. To which the other merely floated to without a second thought. “I don’t think everyone enjoyed it; some of the followers of Eden’s Gate preferred to live more modestly, feeling it brought them closer to God. Spices were pushing that boundary because they weren’t necessary. I argued that they were.” Plating things up on two paper dishes, he carried them to the table and placed them down. “Not much has changed in the science of cooking from when I was alive beyond the tools to do so, it seems.” He moved to get a beer and brought it over to Sharky before taking his place opposite of him.

“So that’s why you were hovering so close every time I made something.” The words came out like a revelation, and he fond himself softening at the ways his eyes lit up with it. _‘Always so clingy John. Someone shows you the littlest bit of attention, and you’ll be hovering close despite the pain that always brings.’_

Instead of addressing the memories that thought threatened to dredge up, he simply dismissed it with an idle statement. “Indeed. The best way to learn is to observe.” True, but boring. _‘He’ll lose interest before long, they always do.’_

“I like talking to you.” The simple statement from the other froze him to the spot, and his eyes pivoted up to watch the other blushing. He could feel the other’s anxious thoughts bubbling to the surface, and comfort was once again quick to jump from his lips.

“The sentiment is returned, I assure you.” He smiled at the human, doing his best not to outwardly wince at the relief that flooded him when he saw those muscles slowly relax. _‘Always so tense. No need to fuss in your mind if it sounded ridiculous. Though I doubt I can ever truly stop you.’_

“You know…I know I’m pretty…but your food is going to get cold.” The teasing tone had his eyes dropping down quickly before he began eating in earnest. Anything to keep from replying, from instigating things further than he had any right to do. _‘You constantly throw me for a loop, distracting me more than I’d like to admit.’_ He kept his thoughts calm, his gestures smooth as the other chuckled quietly. There was a long pause as each of them ate, before the silence was broken once more by Sharky. “This is really good. Gonna need the energy today. We have to go to Holland Valley.”

He could feel the other watching him before he nodded slowly, admitting the truth he could no longer deny. “I know.”

“You gonna be okay?” The question was kind, gentle—uncomfortable and unusual.

“Of course, why wouldn’t I be?” He could feel himself bristling up as he spoke, and he tried to force it down. _‘It isn’t your fault I’ve been lying to you.’_

He looked up at the other as he swallowed before replying, and he forced himself down into calm once more. “Call it a hunch.” He smiled a bit at that, before he shrugged the tiniest bit. 

“I’ll be fine. So we have to go talk to this Zap Cappa?” Recalling the name was difficult, and it felt wrong as he said it. But he wanted the other to relax a bit, to focus on what he needed to say.

“Zip Kupka. Close though.” He nodded along at the name, it clicking into place with the thought of _close enough._ “And yeah. He’s been talking about how Angels have come to Hope Valley because of some government research facility they need to protect now more than ever.” He continued his own eating as he let the topic change back to business. “I mean, he’s almost right—except for the part where they’re all holograms meant to throw us off course. And the government’s involvement—or lack thereof rather.” His eyes widened a bit as the other rambled along, smiling a bit at him. “I can remember a good conspiracy theory, alright? I just think the government’s a cop out in the long term. Government’s run by people too, and they’re just as dumb as the rest of us.” _‘Your interests are still surprising me.’_

“Agreed. Men are far too simple to hold that much power over corruption on they’re own. Though I do think they are a threat on their own, I don’t think it’s as large a concern as most think it is.” He replied after swallowing, lifting his hands to balance them out like scales. “Humans can be monsters, but they couldn’t hold that strong a grip on power for that long without being discovered without some help from the divine—or the unholy, as it usually is.” He was debating power in politics and deals not much different with their own now, smiling all the while as he offered his own opinion on the matter. The smile he was graced with was worth the soft underbelly he was clearly exposing to earn more of his thoughts. _‘Keep thinking about me and I’ll be at your side forever. You’ll never be rid of me.’_

“Yeah, fucking exactly!” The other’s loud laughter that accompanied the shout had him grinning in triumph before the human’s face leveled out into a serious one once more. “Anyway, plan is to drive out and have a chat. And hopefully learn something new, though I bet its all wrapped in a mystery and cloaked in riddles and enigmas.” He was laughing at the choice of words before he could stop himself and finally he realized Sharky was wearing that same smile of triumph he’d been wearing earlier. _‘I might be crazy, but it seems you’re trying to impress me too.’_

“Alright then. When did you want to leave?” He asked the inevitable question, and the other gave a short sound close to a laugh.

“Next year?” He asked, and now it was his turn to give that choked laugh.

“Won’t be a next year if we wait til next year,” he retorted.

“Fair enough,” Sharky answered, shaking his head slowly. “Well, I guess we can wait a bit. I wanna put it off until close to dusk, increase our chance of encountering him so we can get an idea of what we’re up against.” The human didn’t realize they already had a one hundred percent chance of encountering the self-proclaimed Angel of Eden’s Gate, but once again he chose to hide that information away for himself. The only one it could eat away at was him this way. And he’d prefer that to the other having another panic attack—for more complicated reasons beyond just saving the world.

“Sounds like you have a plan in place.” He finally let himself speak, leaning forward over the table and towards the other just a bit.

The human gave a laugh, lifting his hand to rub at his goatee with a faint dusting of a blush forming across the bridge of his nose and along his cheeks before he grinned and waggled his eyebrows towards him. “I’ve learned a few lessons, you could say.” He found himself flushing as well as a primal thought flashed through his head— _‘Confidence looks damn good on him.’_

“Color me impressed.” John admitted instead, finishing his food quickly before the other stood to collect their dishes, laughing as he carried them over to the trash.

“An actual compliment?” Sharky joked, his humor rumbling low through his words. “I must be getting to you.”

“You could say that.” He confessed, before silencing the thought threatening to slip past his lips and into the space between them. _‘You’ve no idea how much you’ve infested my thoughts.’_

It wasn’t long before they loaded up, his companion radioing his aunt about needing to borrow the truck for a few more days. He could hear a woman’s voice teasing him about introducing his boyfriend to her before giving some sort of agreement. Sharky merely turned off the radio, tugged his cap lower over his face, before he headed to the truck—a burning cigarette already between his lips. He wasn’t sure, but he was fairly sure the other hadn’t used a lighter. _‘He’s using his powers without thinking…are they connected to his emotions? That might be disastrous…’_

Instead of asking what had him fuming, John watched out the window at the moving landscape. The speed of which they were moving had him admittedly hovering closer to the other—he hadn’t been lying when he’d stated he didn’t like these. At least not yet; there was no soul to this metal contraption, no bond on which you could build trust. Not like with a horse. He’d much rather walk through the planes to get elsewhere, but his charge couldn’t do that. Not yet, anyway. He could see the changes already starting to show, things the other couldn’t see with a mortal eye yet. The veins and arteries crawling up from under the edge of his shirt were glowing like fresh magma under the crust of the earth, and every now and then his eyes would catch the light and glow and he already knew what change would be next. But telling him would do no good beyond cause panic, because until he accepted it he wouldn’t see it. _‘Becoming a demon is tedious and the transition can last ages in some stubborn cases. I’ll stay by him every step of the way...’_

He could feel the shift in the atmosphere as they crossed the county line into the valley. He moved to crane his head up in favor of watching the open skies above them. He’d always wanted to fly, felt some kind of tie to the expanse of freedom above them here. The technology to do so had started shortly after his death, and he learned about it from contraband newspapers the living cultists hid away and he’d been envious. He didn’t like cars, but something that flew through the sky? That was something he’d be willing to try. _‘Anything to get closer to those clouds.’_ He pulled his eyes away from the oranges of the setting sun, turning to look at the other just as he was glancing over.

Before he could offer a smile, a figure materialized by the side of the road. It didn’t take John long to realize who it was as they passed him; white shirt with a dark vest, dark hair pulled neatly back into a bun, and his beard was trimmed more meticulously than his own was. He stopped walking as they drove by, time feeling like it slowed down at the other demon turned to make eye contact as his wings flashed into view briefly. _Joseph._ He could feel his heart seizing up as the other gave him a soft smile—one he once found comforting.

He tried to brace himself for the presence appearing in the small backseat just behind them, but there was no way he could have. As soon as Joseph materialized behind them, his breath caught in his throat and he refused to turn around. “So what I’ve heard is true. Brother John has returned, and with his own follower.” He hated the implications the other made—that he was using Sharky the way he’d used him. He could feel the muscles in his arms tensing, as he continued to speak. “The world has become worse since we left. If we had finished our mission, it would have been pure by now. Ready for us to step into the garden itself. Perhaps this time…we’ll finish what we’ve started.”

“No.” It was quick off his tongue, and he glanced over to his friend to watch his own muscles tightening as he gripped the steering wheel. He needed to get them out of this; they weren’t prepared for Joseph, they never could be. 

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t quite hear that.” Joseph asked, his voice closer as he’d clearly leaned forward in his own seat. The tone was needling against his skull, thinly veiled disappointment hidden just under the surface enough to make him feel like he was bleeding into his own lungs. He felt like he was suffocating, but he forced the words out. 

“I broke our tie.” There was a stabbing feeling in his chest, where his heart still barely beat beneath his ribs. It’d been centuries, and he still felt that crippling feeling of resentment for himself and the choices he made. “You’re nothing to me.” The choice he made to abandon the only person who ever cared for him for a fear of dying, which he still did.

“We were both the blood of our haven; it’s a harder tie to disconnect yourself from.” His older brother’s tone of false acceptance still twisted at his insides, but he could feel his own anger bubbling back up to the surface in direct conflict to his own heavy guilt.

“And yet here I am…free from your sins, the ones you look to place onto others.” His eyes dropped down to his own arms, where he knew his scars to be hidden beneath the sweatshirt he was still wearing. _‘Holy shit, I’m still wearing his sweatshirt.’_ He subconsciously pulled his arms around him a bit as the other gave a soft sound of surprise at his words.

“Your words wound me, Brother John. You think me corrupt, that the Voice would lead me so far astray?” As he spoke again, he finally lifted his gaze up to the tiny mirror. His own eyes looked onto those hazy blue eyes that wanted so desperately to change the world around him. He could still feel it in the other, the belief that what he was doing was for the greater good.

“I thought I’d made it quite obvious what my opinions were on your Voice.” The words were snapped out and kept him frozen in place. Always prepared for a blow he knew would never come from the other, at least not the way he always expected it to. That’s why the other’s words caught him off guard, just like always.

“I miss you at my side, always so level headed in our plan of Conquest.” Joseph’s voice was low, almost mournful. As if he’d moved onto another world instead of denying the poison the other was trying to force down his throat.

“ _You_ were _conquest_. I was famine; I was never the one liked.” He was entering a seething rage, flames starting to form and lick across his knuckles as he clenched his fists. A feeling of loneliness washed over him afterwards, quickly snuffing out the flames as he pulled his eyes away from the mirror in favor of watching his hands again with a new feeling of shame blossoming in his chest. “An outcast amongst outcasts.”

“If anyone pushed you it away, it was always yourself.” His brother’s tone was indignant, scoffing at the very idea he’d be perceived as anything but the wise preacher he had worked so hard to become. “I merely offered my love and support, with open arms always waiting.”

“That’s bullshit and you know it!” His yelling made Sharky jump beside him, and he turned his gaze to the human with an apology ready that he didn’t find himself voicing. “There were always conditions, and I never met them.”

“Even in death, you’re still just as angry and eager to deny the Truth.” He kept his eyes on Sharky, trying to keep hold of some solid ground while the demon in the backseat slowly tried to wash the earth away from underneath his feet—and just when he got his footing back at that. Instead he took note of the way his human’s jaw clenched a little more and how he tightened the grip he had on the wheel in front of him even more. “So long as you’re correct, you’ll change the world as you see fit. And look at what you’ve created—he’d be a fine addition to our family.” He felt a flash of anger, this time not from his own mind but from the one beside him.

It was Sharky that raised his voice now, speaking quickly as he made a turn in the road and sped up a bit. “Okay, here’s where I step in. See, I was keeping quiet cause it’s clear John has some shit to say. But you’re not talking about me like I’m not here.” The other’s voice was steady, and it felt like a breath of fresh air in the small metal space they were trapped in. “Long story short, I’m not joining shit and neither is he—and you are not welcome in my— _our_ —company.” He picked up the anger there, and he realized this might be bringing his own memories back.

He was surprised when they were met with a sound of amusement. He looked at the mirror again, still refusing to look directly at him, and he found the other’s gaze no longer on him. “You think you have the power to disperse me?” The soft smile that spread across his face sent chills down his spine before he spoke again. “I can see why he’s drawn to you.” _‘Now he’s talking about me as if I’m not here. Why am I still so surprised? I really shouldn’t be—centuries have passed and he still finds ways to make me feel small.’_

“And I can see why you make his insides squirm.” Sharky’s statement of dismissal made him laugh, a short sound that brought the other demon’s eyes back to him in the mirror. “Now get the fuck out of my space.”

“No.” It might have been the shortest answer the other had ever given, and the wicked grin threatening to pull at the edges of his smile terrified him more than disappointing him ever had.

But Sharky didn’t seem to care, laughing loudly as those veins in his neck started glowing like freshly spilled lava—bright and glowing orange, smoke slipping from his lips as he started speaking again. “See, you say that…like you’ve got some choice in the matter. But I’ve done looped us around, and there’s the line where the Valley ends.” He nodded forward, and John looked around to realize that they had in fact been turned around and relief started flooding through him. “My understanding is as soon as I’ve crossed that line you’ll just have to fuck off, won’t you?”

“I’ll be seeing you again.” It was a thinly veiled promise of the other’s own form of justice, a sentence he’d heard before all those years ago.

“You bet your fucking ass you will, Broseph.” Those nervous giggles started to break up his words and the loud thoughts spilling from the other’s mind and into his own—a wild haze of uncertainty except for a singular, focused anger at the uninvited guest behind them. “But which time will be the last? That’s the real fucking head scratcher here…isn’t it?”

“Quite amusing…I suppose we’ll find out together.” Joseph’s tone was curt, before they crossed the line of his territory and he was ripped out of the cab like smoke snatched away by a wind they couldn’t feel.

“That’s what I’d thought you say, you stupid fucking demon.” He turned around in his seat, and he watched the other hovering on his now visible and charred wings, the blue halo of fire above his head off-setting with the inky veins he could see travelling his arms and the barely contained look of rage he was shooting towards them before his form dissipated into scattered blue lights that faded away on that same breeze. “You okay?” The question made him turn away finally to look at Sharky, and the look of concern the human— _his human_ —was shooting his way had that squirming-fluttering feeling rising up in his chest again. He swallowed it down, before nodding finally.

“Yes, I’m fine.” He was surprised he could lie so well to him, but he was nodding finally. He was a lot of things currently—fearful, anxious, nervous, _angry_ —but he couldn’t quite say ‘fine’ was at the top of the list. If the other hadn’t been with him during that confrontation, he would have burned down half the valley and still lose the argument. “I know enough.”

“That stand for Fucked-up, Insecure, Neurotic, and Emotional?” Sharky asked, and for a moment he had a real fear the other knew he was lying before he shook his head and waved a hand. “Its, uh…it’s a song. From after your time. So what is he?” He took a deep breath as he was asked the question he was expecting, filing through his mental catalog of information he’d been compiling over his lifetime and during his death—his mind screeching to a halt as things clicked into place and he found himself grinning smugly.

“A pride demon,” he supplied finally, Sharky laughing beside him loudly now.

He only offered two words as they made their way back home: “Makes sense.”


	8. Fixed and Crazy--Aphid Attraction!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Faith does a little gardening after Sharky learns more about his own possible future.

After they got back from their encounter with Joseph, and the skipped chance to talk to Zip, Sharky was on edge in a way he had experienced only a few times. He was angry for someone else. His pulse felt like it was spiking and burning through his skin and it made him wince on occasion as they stayed silent. He’d noticed the other sliding over next to him again about the same time he actually realized the other was wearing his sweatshirt. And he felt a small amount of shame for the feeling of possession rising up over that sight; _‘He’s my demon, I have to protect him.’_ The other wasn’t anything beyond his friend and he’s already accepted that the other would never feel the same way in return. _‘Its just a crush, and he can look after himself.’_

But a second later he was back to being angry as he thought about everything Joseph had said to him and the anxious feeling niggling at the edges of his senses that had started from the moment they passed him. _‘What kind of piece of shit does any of that? Its like being around Hurk Sr. but ten times worse cause this fucker thinks he’s enlightened.’_ He gave a quiet grumble as they pulled back up into the trailer park with a small sense of discouragement—they were always running away, running back here, instead of fighting—as he parked the truck and walked back inside to probably plan.

He found himself hovering near the other as they walked through the door. He turned to look at John for a long moment before finally speaking. “Forgot to tell you, but green looks good on you.” He was hesitant to voice his opinion, especially when John faltered and spun around as several expressions passed over his features really quickly. He saw a bit of pride, some embarrassment, and something he couldn’t name until the other starting talking and he found himself not lingering on the mystery in favor of listening to the other talk.

“I’m sorry, I forgot I was wearing it. I put it on this morning when I got up. It felt a little chilly, and I’m always cold as it is.” The way his voice was trying not to waver hurt his soul a bit, the demon tugging at the sleeves in a quick attempt to pull them off. He moved quickly, setting his hands on his shoulders to still him, making him stop.

“You know you ain’t gotta explain yourself to me, right?” Sharky asked the question lowly, hoping to comfort the other in some attempt at privacy in their already isolated location. The way John was trying to look coolly back at him told him his answer—he’d rehearsed an answer, a lot like he usually did. “I got other sweatshirts man, and I guess I didn’t need one cause I didn’t even think about it.” He’d actually felt a little warm today, so there was some truth to the statement. “Its just a compliment. It looks good on you.” That one was more truth out his mouth as he’d realized he’d meant it. _‘He looked natural in it—like he was always meant to wear it. What kind of thought even is that?’_

“I…thank you?” It was most definitely a question, as he tilted his head a bit as he continued to look at him. The demon finally offered a smirk. “Is there something else you want to ask?”

 _‘Quick! Think fast—bullshit your way out of the silence in which you’ve just been staring at him! Fuck, I’m still doing it!’_ The panicked thoughts filled his mind and he could feel his eyes widening before he pulled his hands back and blurted something out. “You said you’re always cold…why?” He dropped his gaze as he stepped away, clearing his throat a bit as a distraction.

John floated over to him, hovering close before he pushed him gently towards the couch. “Would you like the scientific reasoning or the mystical one?” He asked the question before pushing Sharky down onto the couch, floating over to take his spot on the other side before turning to watch him head on.

“Both? Yeah, both.” Anything to get him to start talking so he could stop thinking, and that train of thought carried him away to panic about scenarios that will never happen—most of them involving John, and how he wished he’d move closer until there was no space between them—until he felt the rush of thanks sweeping over him as the other finally started speaking.

“Scientific…I am not technically alive. I’m a form of undead creature that’s run by elemental power, a little bit of altered biology, and quite a bit of spite. My heart beats, but very slowly, which also means my blood pumps at the same speed. Which is almost nonexistent. I can fake a heartbeat as an auditory trick if I need to—passing as a human being . Fun fact for you there.” He always spoke with his hands, at times conjuring illusions to make points. At one point he held a heart in his hands, its chambers pulsing abysmally slow despite the speeding pulse he could feel in his own veins. “I have quite a few immunities now as well; I can’t be poisoned in the traditional sense, alcohol and smoke do not corrode my organs, and I don’t need to fulfill basic needs. Such as breathing, sleeping, eating, drinking, etc. It’s basically everything I hoped the afterlife would be like in the height of my sinning in life.” He started listing things off on long, elegant ink stained fingers.

He couldn’t stop the breathy laugh he gave, so close to being distracted again. He cleared his throat after a minute, before looking down at his own hands again to eye those brands he barely noticed anymore. “Alright, I get it. That checks out with the limited knowledge I fucking have on the matter.” He grinned now, before daring to look at the other and trying to choke the words out before his breath seized in his throat. “Now what’s the mystical one?”

“This one is going to take a little longer, but I’m sure you’ve figured that part out.” He was trying to make a joke. But he was right—this one would be longer, and he knew it when John had saved it for last. But he was prepared as he settled back onto the couch as the other pulled his legs up to curl around himself. “I’m not quite sure what kind of being created demons specifically, but they must have considered themselves quite humorous in their own right because nothing makes much damn sense if you think about it too hard. Some of it is just that obvious. I’m cold because fire can feel cold.” Sharky watched his lips curl around the words he was speaking, and the soft wisps of smoke the escaped past his lips curled up around is face and drawing him back to his eyes again. _‘Focus, goddamn it.’_ “Demons are often divided into the seven sins, as well as based around seven elements. They are always a combination of those fourteen things. Which makes for a wide range of creatures you can encounter, and they were all created from a being who let’s face it…was just in the mood for a little chaos.” The sentiment made him laugh, nodding a bit. Chaos was something he could almost understand—it came with being an arsonist. Now he focused on the actual subject matter, words catching his interest instead of the other’s hands as he began listing things off again on those damn pianist fingers. 

“The elements: fire, water, earth, storm, dark, light, and life. Three opposing sets of two, and a single neutral element. Those sins of course, I’m sure you know them, are pride, lust, sloth, envy, wrath, greed, and gluttony. Yours truly…” John stopped to motion towards himself now, sparks of fire lifting from those singing evernburning spots on his arm as if to prove a point. “…is a combination of wrath and fire.” _‘Wrath…who’da thunk it. I’d figure it be pride with that gesture. Or lust, with the thoughts—stop it. Stop. It.’_ A nervous laugh slipped past his defenses, and the other merely quirked an eyebrow to go with the smirk he was now wearing before continuing to speak. “You have to have a strong tendency to one of those for some reason or another I have yet to quite pinpoint—beyond the possibility of our powers being based off emotions. And let’s be honest here—most of our sins are feelings.” He nodded along, agreeing with that at least. It dragged him out of those obnoxious thoughts and into worse ones, involving his own sins…what would be his? _‘Lust…or envy? Where’s being a cowardly little fuck fall in there?’_

“I’m explaining all of this so you’ll understand what we’re dealing with here.” John’s voice pulled him from his thoughts of self doubt roughly, like a breath through the rough surface of the river. The other slid closer to him on the couch, stopping when he shook his head briefly. Why was he stopping him? _‘Why am I stopping him?’_ He took a deep breath, focusing on his hands. He finally gave the barest of nods, and he felt the others cool fingertips resting along his arm. “Just from the minimum observation we’ve both been able to do, I know what each is, and in turn their weaknesses.” He felt his chest easing up as he focused on the other’s touch, trying his best to step out of that feeling of panic once more. This was a bad time to let that consume him; god he wished he could be as calm as the other was. “Jacob’s a mix of earth and gluttony, Faith is sloth and storm, and Joseph is pride and light.” 

He let himself focus on the words now, breathing slowly before John finally pulled away from him to hunt through pockets before he found the other passing him a lit cigarette. “I described Faith as a dream demon before, but dreaming is part of sloth if all you want to do is just keep dreaming your life away. She’ll bend reality around you in an instant to try and win you to staying at her side with promises of peace and a paradise you can live in with her forever. And you will, once you waste away. Then your spirit will stay with her while your body joins the river. Then you become an entity she can corrupt at will to become her soldiers—her Angels. And if you fight it, make her exert the extra effort, her winds could rip you apart. Stay grounded, find a thought that keeps you in reality, and you’ll be able to overcome her and she’ll do all the work for you.” _‘Can you just stay close always? You seem to ground me…’_ He smiled a bit at the thought, before the other moved on in his more detailed explanations on what they were dealing with. 

“Jacob fed on fear in life, a man tainted by a war he never truly left. In death he became one with the earth, allowing him to roam it with elaborate ease and blend in instantly by standing still. He’s the ground, the dirt and the stone and the mud beneath the riverbed. Its what allows him to almost phase through the landscape, to move without leaving a trace behind unless he intends it.” He understood suddenly why the other demon had managed to blend so well into his surroundings, like all his edges were blurry until he wanted to be seen. “And he just wants to consume…everything. He’s fueled by a bloodlust that could never be fulfilled and he’ll just keep seeking the next hunt. Though I suspect if he likes the chase enough, he’ll prolong it. Like a cat, torturing its prey just for the thrill of it. And he seems to like you—take that as you will. He doesn’t like light because like most predators he’s nocturnal, and light hurts his senses. It doesn’t burn him like it would if his element was darkness, but it’s definitely handy to have. So is fire.” He continued explaining and he could feel the remnants of that fear from the night before still twitching in the cervices of his veins.

The other seemed to stiffen now, at the final name and a clear source of discomfort for him still. He reached for the other’s arm before he started talking and he found himself freezing in place while he spoke. “Joseph…he always thought himself in the light of God so it makes sense he was tied to the searing pain it can bring. He’s fueled by his pride, all his powers playing off of that.” His voice was cooler, in more control than when they’d been in his presence. He could understand the tie; he was intense but he didn’t think himself to be. “He’ll be a bit more free to walk among people because humans fear the dark and keep light close at hand. Dusk and daybreak will be the times he’s most powerful because that’s when the light—the sun—is in full control of the sky. In the sense that those are the times held most sacred in society still. He’ll have some energy in the dead of night, power he’s retained by absorbing the sun, but it diminish over time. You’ll have to outlast him, keep shelter, and don’t look directly into his lights or he’ll still your mind and try to sway you to his side.” He seemed more distant as he continued to talk, when he finally made himself move and take his hand quietly. John looked to him suddenly, a soft plea of understanding in his eyes. “He’s charismatic, and you want to keep listening to him, and he knows that. Though, I think your anger might actually keep that in check. Becoming friends seems to have its own perks we did not expect.” He gave his own hesitant laugh before he pulled his hand gently from Sharky’s. “So…thoughts?”

“Once again I’m in awe of how fucking incredible you are.” Well, fuck if that wasn’t blunt. _‘Wait, shit! Take it back, but be cool!’_ “I mean with all the shit you know. You figured all that out by me getting the shit scared out of me.” He was giggling again by the end of it before he settled back on the couch to just focus on the cigarette in his hand instead of his own embarrassment.

“On the contrary, I had my own theories beforehand.” John leaned forward, reaching out to snag the stick of tobacco from between his fingers to puff at it. He let the smoke trail out of his mouth before he spoke. “You getting the shit scared out of you helped confirm them. So thank you.” He laughed and pushed at the demon’s shoulder with no real effort behind it. “Besides, just because I can tell you what they are does not mean I can tell you what they do exactly. I am a source of information gathered, but it is limited still.” He could see doubt stirring briefly in the other before he cleared his throat and shook his head in response. 

“Yeah, shorty. Anytime.” Sharky took the time to smile at him, trying to catch his eyes before nodding. “Glad I could help.” He felt himself begin blushing when the other gave him a strange look of awe, coughing before changing the subject back to business quickly. “So, uh…what do we want to do now? We’ve done confronted everyone. They all know we’re here and that we know that they know. There’s also all the little critters we may need to do something about later.” 

He received a bitter sigh, before John flopped backwards onto the couch and kicked his legs out so they were bent up over his lap. “I’d honestly like to eat something, maybe listen to the radio—could flip through frequencies, see if anything is already stirring up.” Well, seeing as how he was suddenly trapped here, he didn’t have it in him to complain or dislodge the other. Though his hands hovering about were a touch uncomfortable, before he finally gave in and settled an arm behind the couch with the other resting experimentally close to the other’s legs.

“We could pull it over closer to the couch.” He was doing his best not to seem awkward, and John seemed to be overlooking it if he’d noticed it. But he got a soft nod at that, before he continued his train of thought derailing towards the end. “We need to start stockpiling shit to fight these motherfuckers. Holy water and items and all that shit. Do crosses work?”

It seemed like a good question, but the other scoffed slightly before he pushed himself up to make eye contact. “Do you believe in them?” 

He hadn’t been expecting that as a response, so he found himself answering slowly but honestly. “…no?” 

“Then, no, they won’t. But you can bless anything with your fire, so whatever you believe would work will.” The information was stated like it’d been obvious before, but only after he said it aloud. Sharky shook his head slowly, because he probably had said it—and he’d daydreamed right through it. “You just have to have faith in something—holy symbols are just good examples.” Alright, that was something he could get behind.

“My shotgun?” Now it had become a game, to name the shit he was already planning to use as a means to gain validation in a sense. But the other smiled, leaning closer in an unspoken dare as he replied. 

“That would work anyway, but blessing the bullets wouldn’t hurt at all.” John’s voice felt cool and refreshing against his warm skin. _‘Why am I so damn warm?’_

“Flamethrower?” He choked out the question, smirking a bit as they each held their ground. He demon gave a thoughtful nod after a minute, before leaning back once more.

“The perfect weapon to use on an earth demon—stone eventually becomes molten if super heated, and the trees will burn away.” The new distance helped him to think as the other spoke, shaking his head quickly to stop the train threatening to speed off in his brain again. “You just can’t be afraid, or it’ll go south quickly.”

“This shit is complicated,” he murmured lowly as he placed the almost spent and forgotten cigarette between his lips. He dared a glance at John, immediately smitten by the other’s lazy grin as he laughed quietly to himself. His legs were still bent across his lap, and he was starting to like the constriction he could feel in his guts and that fluttering in his chest. He could almost imagine the butterflies humming under his skin as he felt himself slowly relaxing into this moment. _‘I don’t just mean the demon thing, John…’_

“I know. Its also my very existence. Isn’t that a fun thought?” His words almost made Sharky jump, what with how he was watching the way his eyes crinkled when he smiled. _‘Wish he’d do that more…’_

“Fuck, John, how do you survive the constant headache?” But he laughed at the words, continuing on the other’s joke. _‘May be my existence too…’_ It was a somber thought that threatened to wipe the smile from his face but when the other man met his eyes, a grin spread across his face and his pulse spiked but he was immediately dragged out of his thoughts and into reality again.

“I stay away from church, and as a general rule I don’t form bonds with anyone I don’t sign a contract with.” John spoke loudly, but the next statement was soft. He wasn’t sure if he was meant to hear it, but he did. “I spent a good portion of my afterlife scaring people away. It’s a hard habit to break.”

“Word.” He gave his agreement, before the other finally freed him in order to drag the radio closer to the couch. He stood up to cook something—which ended up being spaghetti. John ended up floating around and sneaking spices into things before Sharky was finally shooed from the kitchen. They settled in on the couch, flipping through stations as they ate in a comfortable silence. 

That was about four hours ago, where he woke up with John curled up beside him again on the couch. He eased himself away, John stretching out in his vacated spot as he slipped on his favorite green hoodie. He found it amusing that it now smelt like a forest fire on the breeze, breathing in the smell for a second as he tugged it on and slipped outside. He retrieved a smoke from his pocket, walking down the steps to settle into an old chair as he eyed the mist curling on the horizon. He tried lighting his cigarette with his fingers—something he’d done yesterday on a petty whim when his aunt had teased him about his ‘new boyfriend’ and he had another flash of wishing—when he looked down, he’d lit the end up. He knew John had noticed, but he didn’t ask. He wasn’t sure how to answer if he had so he was glad he didn’t; but now it left him wondering what fueled those fires in himself now. 

His gaze traced his own hands and again he wished he’d had more control over these powers. He’d always been close to fire—this should be easy for him! But John had said control came with emotions. And those emotions were pretty much limited to the realm of sins. He sighed and tried to light his fingertips on fire. John usually snapped his fingers. He tried to imitate the action, repeating it with a growing frustration until he growled lowly. _‘How the fuck does he make this look so damn easy?’_ And with the thought, a blaze of flames shot from his fingers and up his face. He managed to light the cigarette, but not without an indignant yelp that had him falling from his seat.

That was about the time he registered the giggling at the edge of those woods barricading his fortress. He frowned a bit, now noticing the sparkling green lights floating in on a lazy breeze. The singing followed shortly and he tried to focus on the world around him as the mist swirled up from the ground softly—forming the vague silhouette of a willowy woman before Faith stepped through. She stood there silently, lifting a hand to wave her fingers towards him with a smile. He felt himself smiling before he could stop himself, before trying to pull his gaze away from her. _‘John says she lies…gotta keep my head on…’_ She frowned slightly, before pouting for a minute then danced slowly closer to him—a deer through the woods, curious about a creature it encountered. 

She stopped a few feet from him, swaying so her skirt swished softly around her legs. She kept her arms behind her back, those thorns digging into her skin with each gesture pushing out small red petals that floated softly to the ground around her feet. She began singing softly now, and the harmonies of her voice washed over him like cool water and he could feel his nerves softening again. _‘But she’s good, remember? You said she was good…something in her was still good.’_

He had said that…and with that thought, he looked up and met her eyes again. She smiled softly to him, holding her hands out for him again. Just like the last time he saw her. He glanced to the door behind him, curiously, before looking back to find her floating closer to him. She still held a hand out for him, and despite the struggle he could still feel inside his chest he was reaching for her before he could question it. 

She closed her fingers around his before pulling him gently along into the mist. Lights stirred up around him, little glimmers catching the light from the moon above them. Her fingers never left his, her skin soft like the petals she was bleeding. She occasionally glanced behind her, to gift him with a soft smile and the occasional giggle that made his heart sing despite the stinging feeling building up along his arm. He just stupidly smiled back at her, before he finally found a voice in himself. “Where are we going?” He wasn’t sure why he asked, immediately feeling like the answer should be obvious with the look of humor she gave him.

“I made a promise to someone, but I’m making one to you now.” Her voice was like many wind chimes in the same breeze, calming in some unexplainable tone. He felt himself melting under her gaze, even more so when she made her promise. “I won’t let anything hurt you.” He believed her, and he nodded along after a minute. 

“Yeah, sister. Same. You’re good people.” Sharky responded, and she gave him an almost puzzled expression in return before she stopped them at the edge of a meadow.

“Focus on me.” She didn’t ask, but he was nodding his agreement before she smiled and motioned in past her. She let him lead the way down the larger path he hadn’t been expecting, small hazy green rabbits hopping lazily by his feet. After a hard look he realized those weren’t rabbits…they were jackolopes. They looked up at him, almost sentient—before he moved on. As he kept moving, he found more creatures of all kinds in unnaturally docile moods. A cougar with a collar caught his eyes, her mismatched eyes dazed but familiar. _‘That’s Peaches…I used to sneak out and give her mother treats when I was a kid but not so much when she came about. Got chased off that land more than any place else, and I never set it on fire once. Just fed some really big kitties.'_ The thought floated through his head and he smiled as he paused, reaching his hands out towards the large cat. He felt Faith’s fingers running down his arms, and he turned to meet her blue eyes. “Focus on me.”

“Yeah…yeah…but why Peaches?” He did as she asked, though his eyes still darted away to watch the large purring form of the giant cat. He wasn’t even sure why he was hung up on it, but he felt like the sky was trying to glitch out around them. 

“I don’t lead the animals here…they find their own way.” She whispered, leaning in inches away from his face. “You truly are odd…” She smiled before she blew a soft shimmering wind into his face. He inhaled the stars at the edges of his vision with a smile as she lifted a hand up to his face, turning him to look at her as she tilted her head softly. “So compassionate…I’m sure you’ll understand. And I’ll steal you away quickly, I promise.” She leaned in, breathing a kiss along the edge of his jaw—and fully succeeding in catching his entire attention. _‘What the fuck…?’_

He erupted into nervous giggles as she pulled away, and he watched her with some sort of disappointment that she was pulling away from him again. “Uh…okay?” Why was she so far, why did he even think she was when she still held his hand.

“Just be forgiving.” She walked along backwards, her eyes solely on his face and he felt himself humming lowly before he answered.

“Forgiving of what?” As he asked, a light begin emanating just behind her. He could see through the misty image that she was before she dispersed like a heavy fog to roll out of the way and behind him. He could see a form coming into view as he squinted towards the light. It fell golden and heavy across the ground around him, as the figure emerging spread its wings out and floated forward. The blue halo came into view and he felt himself preparing to sigh in exasperation. He could feel Faith floating just behind him, her cooling presence sizzling where the light fell on her. He glanced back to her to catch her wincing, and he moved to stand in front of her in a half thought out attempt at a shield. _‘I’m not supposed to be her hero, but here goes.’_

“Ah, there he is. I was looking forward to the chance of meeting you, but our first encounter didn’t go as well as it should have.” Joseph’s voice was level, trying to soothe at his edges like menthol for a cold. It intruded on his senses, but he held his ground as he watched the demon float towards him—those charred wings arcing around him gracefully. It was infuriating and terrifying both when the other reached his hands forward and his body moved on its own. Spots of contained lights drifted into view and he close his eyes quickly. _‘Don’t look into his lights. Hope that doesn’t count the big one from before…’_

He opened his eyes when he heard what he thought was soft laughter, but he only found the other staring patiently back at him. “Yeah, well, you’re a tool…so…” He murmured softly as he was pulled along into the air a bit. He could feel soft winds curling around him that let him glide along. He smiled a bit, remembering Faith’s earlier words. _‘She said focus on her…was that a trick or a hint?’_ He focused on her auras of greys and greens behind him as they settled back onto the ground again. “I don’t see this going much better.”

“Why is that? Some unspoken loyalty to a demon you’ve only just met?” His tone was different here, a little more tense than he was led to believe the pride demon was ever supposed to be. “In such a case, why not believe in me? I have a system, I have order…” He just sounded desperate and faded around the edges, but that also made him suspicious. _‘He’s the biggest threat…remember that.’_

“What’s wrong with some chaos in the world?” The argument was quick to spring from his lips as he shifted into another broad stance. The demon still held his wrists softly, and for some reason he was having quite a struggle trying to make himself pull away. He could feel the other demon floating just behind him, fingertips hovering along his shoulders and back like some kind of tie to reality. She was using her own weakness to ground him right now, there was nothing she could gain from trying to assist him…she had to be on his side. 

“It leads to cruelty.” His eyes snapped back to Joseph, frowning at the high and mighty tone floating down from someone no bigger than he was. “To neglect and abandonment, to abuse of the land and the spirit.” He looked him over as he spoke, taking in the tiny details with his every movement. _‘I don’t know what I’m looking for…but he does believe what he’s saying…what the hell happened to him?’_

“It also leads to compassion. Nothing brings a community together quicker than a little mayhem.” He thought about the few storms that have hit Montana, and they always brought this little part of the world together. People who didn’t even know who he was would come out to check on stranded areas, bringing food or water or even propane. He smirked at the knowledge, before he let himself challenge the demon with the help of the one at his back. “I thought you were supposed to be good at talking.” 

He watched the other’s face contort ever so slightly, the frown that briefly flashed across his face revealed large canines that almost bulged out past his lips. “I am, you’re just a hard listener.” He flashed back to a passive expression just as quickly, his grip tightening briefly around his wrists.

He let himself smirk, rebuttal already leaping from his tongue. “That’s not what John said.”

The other openly chuckled, his words barely containing the hiss of his tone. “Why do you so openly trust someone who keeps so many secrets from you?” 

He could feel thoughts swelling up in him, doubts he’d been swallowing back for a while. “What the fuck did you say?” He was angry he could stir this up in him, angry at the very thought that the other would lie to him. But most of all, he felt jealous that the other even had the ability to lord that over him as well. “John wouldn’t lie to me. No, no…he wouldn’t. But you would.” John was all he had right now, and how dare he hint he knows him better? Maybe he did once, but not anymore. He fed on that feeling of envy of whatever their bond had been because if he’d known him any sooner, he already knew he’d be willing to give his life for him, or at the very least his humanity. “I just don’t get what you have to gain by swaying me to your side. If I don’t stop you, someone will. Someone did before! Something bigger than me at that! But you’re worried about me…or are you worried about John?” He hummed as he felt fire licking across his own knuckles now, traveling to where the other was clutching at his wrists. “Do you think digging at me is gonna upset him? You’re more delusional than I am if you think he’s got a strong bond with me. I’m nothing.” _‘I’m nothing, and I’m fucking jealous because you’re prideful ass doesn’t understand how fucking lucky you were…that you had to go and ruin good people because you can’t see the good past your own nose. And I’m jealous that you don’t fucking care. Not feeling anything would solve so much of my fucking problems—’_ He started bullshitting more petty reasons for that green rage in him until the flames travelling across his hands spiked forward.

Joseph yelped and pulled his hands away, shaking them as he forced himself back into a solemn silence. “It’ll happen eventually.” He grinned widely at the pride flooding through him now. _‘Look what spite can get ya. Guess it pays to be insecure, cause all of this is real.’_ He frowned at the faux preacher’s continued lecture. “The world was always meant to burn, so we can rise from the ashes—reborn so we are free from the sins of life, free from the debts of death, free from the mindless violence of the world. It has to all burn down, so we can advance.”

“Well, it ain’t gonna happen now. You’ve seen so much, you’re blind again old man.” He was snarling as he stepped forward, drawing on that emotion he’d stuffed deep down inside for so long. _‘You’ve got so much power and you can’t even use it right. A fucking waste.’_

“No…I’m not the blind one, child.” He felt his temperature spiking as he pooled the fire into his palms while the other chided him softly, like he could see something he couldn’t. He didn’t like that, didn’t like the judgement he thought he could see in his expression.

“There goes your pride, getting in the way.” Sharky hurled the balls of flame at him, the other floating back delicately dodging out of the way.

“How long until you embrace your sin, Charlemagne? How long until you accept those changes you can already feel taking hold of you?” Joseph was taunting him now, and he’d chase him down if he didn’t feel a tugging at his hood. He stepped backwards, following the silent request but not without his own final words.

“How long until yours drowns you?” The words were barked out as he backed away, never fully turning his back to him as left with a final thought. “Hubris before the gods, motherfucker. Otherwise you crash and burn, like fucking Icarus. I’ll see you at the bottom.” He was laughing, full of an adrenaline that numbed him to a lot of the effects of the storm leading him along now. She was speeding along, the wind carrying them quickly over the ground before he burst through the trees to tumble into a small clearing. 

He was panting as he sat up, but to his surprise he heard her giggling behind him before she threw her arms around his shoulders. Faith hugged him as she rested her head on his shoulder, smiling softly at him. “You tried to protect me. That was so sweet…does that mean you forgive me?” Her voice was soft, and whispered right next to his ear it sent shivers down his spine and had him smiling.

“Well, yeah. You helped me, I should help you…right?” He was being honest, despite the niggling feeling of guilt eating at his insides for breaking the promise he’d made John. _‘The promise I made to my demon…’_ He blurted out his brief suspicions while he slowly sunk into that guilt. “But why’d you’d take me to him? And why’d you warn me?”

Her face faded of all expression as she watched him now. She lifted her hands to cradle his face as she slid around in front of him. She tilted his face up so she could look down into his eyes, a misty blue-green aura forming around her as her eyes began to glow. “I do as I’m told, but I can see your truth…and its different from his. Its clearer, brighter—better.” He could see the soft crackling of the electricity trapped in her eyes, soft blue arcing beams that bounced around as the wind around them picked up and her pupils disappeared into the glow. Smoke slipped past her lips as she spoke quietly afterwards, a language he didn’t understand, but her winds started to lift her hair up around her like it had become its own writhing entity. It curled its tendrils around them before everything stopped quickly as she leaned in to whisper softly against his lips. “We weren’t all brave enough to step away…even if some of us wanted to.”

“You coulda left with John.” He whispered back to her, some soft respect for the moment as she shook her head sadly now.

“John left when he was fed to the pyres.” She had a fair point, and nodded.

It took a minute before he answered her with a question meant to test boundaries. “…you could leave now.” 

She stilled immediately, before springing to her feet quickly. “No…no, I cannot. I really couldn’t.” She helped him up, moving her hands so she could run her palms over her shoulders as if she was cold. “The ties are too strong…he’d be so mad if he knew I’d even thought about it.” Her voice was soft, both drowned out and carried away by her winds. He moved forward to rest his hands on her shoulders, freezing when she looked up at him with wide panicked eyes and inky tears pooling down from her eyes.

“Hey, hey…calm down. Deep breaths.” He spoke quietly, leaning in to give her his full attention. He wiped at her cheeks with a shaky calloused thumb, but she smiled past his hands. “Don’t worry about it. Forget I said anything.”

“Why?” Her words almost got lost, but he blinked for a minute before he tried to clarify what that question meant.

“What’s that?” He asked, and she smiled before she reached up to take his hands. “Why why?”

“Why would you ask me?” She turned his hands over in her own, tracing the lines of them with her eyes and a quiet hum.

“Why wouldn’t I?” That was a dumb question. Why shouldn’t he try to help her? Out of all of them, nothing she had done had been cruel. She’d just made him walk off a bridge, but he knew how to swim so it was really fine. He guessed it came from that same annoying instinct he’d had since the moment he actually met her. _’She doesn’t belong with Joseph.’_ But was that really his own thought? Despite the thought, he spoke to her another truth. “Just…something in me says you’re good. Something says I should trust you.”

“Do you?” She seemed almost breathless as she pushed the words out, and he was suddenly aware of how still her form felt while it was nestled against him. Wait, when had she slipped so close to him.

“Yeah. I guess I do.” He whispered the answer, before a thought echoed through his head. _‘John’s gonna be pissed…’_

“Thank you,” she whispered, as she pulled him in for a tight hug as they stopped at the edge of the path he didn’t remember stepping onto with her in the slightest.

“Don’t make me regret it.” He meant it as a joke, but she darted up onto her tiptoes to look him in the eye as she smiled.

“Never…” She breathed the word against his lips before she leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. Some instinct in him made him respond, and when she pulled back her eyes flitted just past him before she sighed. “Good night, Sharky. I’ll see you soon.” She stepped backwards and dispersed into mist once more, leaving him in a mess of confusion.

“Anytime…” He wasn’t sure who the words were for, but he turned around he headed towards his porch when he caught sight of who was standing on the steps. “Fuck…John, hey! Holy shit, you were right. I just had to ground myself, and I don’t get that fuzzy head. And I actually used my powers!” The other was standing frozen, eyes bouncing back and forth between him and the path he’d stepped off of. Everything about him was stiff, so he tried pushing past it and onto the next bit of info he apparently had to vomit up. “I threw fireballs at big bad Broseph, almost hit him too—” Now John’s eyes widened with a new concern, and his gaze stayed on him even as he stepped just out of his reach when he tried. “John?”

“You…followed her.” He was silent but seething, the burning spot on his skin erupting into soft blue flames and spreading across his skin. “Not only that, you trust her. I saw how she was all over you. You ki—” Something about the way he phrased that stung him more, like he’d cheated somehow in a relationship that never had the chance to bloom, and he cut of the last word before he could hope to catch it.

“People can be good, John. You just gotta—” He winced as he jumped to his own defense, the demon growling lowly as he cut him off. There was a betrayal there he couldn’t understand—had Joseph been right. _‘Is he lying to me about something?’_

“Yeah, I know, you gotta give them a chance. You have to love them. But they hurt me, and they don’t deserve it. Especially her, no one was more loyal than the Siren. Always in his shadow, her reverence for that man matched no one else’s. To be a Faith, you had to be ready for self-sacrifice.” John was moving closer, leaning into his space with poorly restrained anger. He frowned at that, at the thought that no one deserved a second chance. _‘You deserve one, I deserve one. Why the fuck can’t she? Why the fuck can’t any of them? Why’s this shit so heavy handed and unfair?’_

“She was scared—” He was defending her again, why was he defending her? Why were these words so quick to his lips. _‘Why does it feel like I need to? There’s nothing I could lose…was there?’_ Then the other yelling made him swallow down everything he might’ve said.

“She was LYING! You’ve been missing for hours, and I got worried—and the damn brands should have been burning the shit out of you. Yes, see, look right there! How did you not notice?” John was frantic as he reached forward, pulling up his hands to eye the brands on his palm and his wrist. He held them up so Sharky could catch sight of them, the edges of them burnt and inflamed. He hissed softly at the demon’s cool touch on the wounds. John pulled away from him now, but he found himself reaching after the other and following him to the door as he opened it. “You know what, this isn’t worth it. Do whatever you want, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. Get inside, take a bath. You reek of henbane toxin and rotting leaves. Its disgusting.”

Sharky hung his head as he started to slip by, before stopping to lean into him a bit. After a second he lifted his hands and tugged the other forward and into his arms. “I’m sorry…I’m really sorry…” He pressed his face against the other’s hair, tears prickling at the corners of his eyes as John finally lifted his arms to return the gesture.

“I know…I know…” He sighed softly, before whispering in response. “Its all complicated, but I know. You just want to help. You want to be the hero.” He could feel the fingers hooking into the back of his sweatshirt, tightening as he continued to speak. But if there was any part of it he could argue with, its was only one thing.

_‘Not everybody’s hero…not even hers…I just wanna be yours.’_


	9. Let Nature Take its Course...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back to the Whitetails for another encounter, but this time Sharky is ready for a fight. Instead, he is given knowledge and a first hand experience to true hunger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is kinda of gross and very graphic. Fair warning, stay safe readers <3

Sharky sat around the campfire again with John, though this time Eli joined them as well. The night had started with an attempt to go collect information from Eli after the mountain man had summoned him via his radio channel. They’d exchanged a little bit of information back at the other’s bunker, after a very awkward introduction between the other two men. John had smiled a bit, and just like always he was overly formal but happy to divulge the information he had. Hell, the two were currently sitting next to each other as the demon in hiding started to provide him with all the information he’d already shared with him the day before. Looking over at the two speaking quietly in an attempt to keep the exchange secret from the creature that would no doubt be stalking them soon had another flash of envy welling up in him. He was doing his best to keep the fire from blooming across his knuckles as he clenched his fists at his sides when he wasn’t poking at the fire. _‘There’s nothing between them, Hell there’s nothing between US. But why’s he gotta sit so close?’_

He heard the low rumbling of a cougar at the edge of the clearing start up, but when he glanced to the other two they hadn’t seemed to notice. _‘Can they not hear it this time? Or are they just two damn distracted with each other?’_ He huffed a bit, turning back to scan the treeline for what was currently trying to hunt them in return, but he couldn’t locate the source. He gave a thoughtful hum before he lit a cigarette and stood up quickly. John and Eli turned to look at him now, falling silent to see what was up before he gave a smile. “Gotta go take a piss, and I’d rather not do it here if you get me. Y’all just hold down the fort, I’ll be back soon.”

“Just be careful, Sharky. Bad things in the woods, but you know that.” Eli told him and he waved him off before he turned to head to the nearest section of the treeline. He swallowed down the lump of fear forming in his throat, some strange sort of green anger making it easier to overcome as he slipped through the trees until he was out of sight. Then he turned abruptly to circle around to where he thought he’d heard the sound coming from before. 

The sounds picked up again, before changing to a different sound you didn’t hear often from a big cat—the little chirps usually reserved for its offspring. _‘Is he trying to lure me further in now?’_ He focused on his hands now, summoning those flames to the tips of his fingers as he moved along. 

He reached a small break in the trees just beyond the clearing they’d sat up camp in, one he hadn’t noticed before, and he could feel his heart rate spike as his body picked up on something he couldn’t see. But he pushed on, chastising himself for his cowardice again— _‘Come on you pansy ass bitch, if Eli can face him you can too’_ —before he watched the demon in question rise from the ground as if he’d just walked out of a lake. He was taller than he remembered but he braced himself and dropped his cigarette, lifting his hands up in defense. Little glowing embers started to flick off from those blazing finger tips, floating in the air around him as the other stalked closer to him.

Jacob grinned widely, in that same terrifying way that showed off those canines of his. A purr rumbled up from his throat now, his large tail swishing around his legs as he stood tall. “Getting brave there, little human.” His voice was low and gravelly, laced with venom as he laughed quietly. This close he could see the blood dried and caked around the corners of his mouth clearly in his own flickering fire light. 

He made himself stand up taller to face off with the other, his entire arms engulfed in fire quickly. “I’m less human than you think.”

“And you’re more demon than you realize.” Jacob’s response was fast as he stopped within arms reach of him. He looked down at him as he tilted his head curiously, his pupils dilating as he watched his every breath. “Why are you in the woods by yourself?” 

“You fucking know why I’m here.” Sharky challenged him, standing taller as he fought back the small niggling sense of fear with an ease that surprised him. _‘His whole shtick is fear, or at least I thought…is he taunting me?’_ He let confusion briefly consume him before he grinned to bear his own teeth back at the other. 

The action earned him a deep, guttural laugh before the demon lifted a hand to point a finger at him. “Yeah, I do. You’re trying to prove yourself, trying to catch Johnny’s attention again.” Jacob’s glowing blue eyes flashed past him briefly, in the direction of their camp, before he leaned down a bit to really look at him now. He could smell the rot on his breath but it didn’t overwhelm him like before. “Petty little thing, aren’t you?”

“You think you’re real smart don’t you?” He hated the nervous giggles that bubbled up from him again, trying to stuff those feelings of jealousy back down inside of him. ‘So what if John’s talking to Eli? So what if Eli’s got his shit together? We’re bonded, that should mean something shouldn’t it?’ He cleared his throat loudly before he spoke up again. “That’s not why I’m here. I’ve got to stop you.”

“And why’s that?” Now the demon was circling him, lowering his form into a hunched position as he moved slowly. He still wasn’t trying to run around him, wasn’t trying to attack the two who weren’t expecting him. He had a feeling that he had the other’s full attention at this point. “My goal isn’t to end existence. I’d rather keep it around, so I could wipe it out with my own two hands. But you understand that about me, I bet.” Goddamn, he did understand. He could feel it rising up in him as the other kept speaking. “You can damn near taste it, can’t you? That _hunger,_ that _thirst_ …like a tickle in the back of your throat that never goes away.” He was being slowly filled up by the need to fill himself up to the brim with anything he could get his hands on. “Just filled with the need to keep consuming, keep devouring…you’ll never be full.” Hunger made his stomach clench suddenly, and he dropped his hands down from their offensive stance to wrap his arms around his stomach now, trying to find comfort somewhere in himself.

He was speaking before he realized it, nodding softly along with the other. “Yeah…wait fuck, no, stop that.” He started shaking his head now, bowing down as he gripped at his stomach.

“Embrace what you are becoming boy—accept it, and accept my gift.” He felt claws on his face, tilting his chin up roughly to lock eyes with the other. He fell into the drowning, icy feeling they brought with their gaze. The other exhaled now, a glittering mist of red slipping through those large fangs that he couldn’t stop himself from breathing in deeply. The prickling feeling of those knife like digits digging into his skin barely registered as he slipped into a new haze. The creature released him but he didn’t step back and neither did he. Sharky just kept watching him in a sort of awe as his hunger over took him now.

He clawed at his own stomach, thankful the fire along his hands didn’t effect him. His stomach felt like it had caved in on itself, like his insides were trying to digest themselves in desperation. His mouth began to water as he gave a low groan, finally dropping to his knees. He was starving, he felt so empty. He watched the demon as he chuckled lowly, sinking into the ground with a wide grin on his face. “I suggest you hunt, boy.” Then he was gone once more, and he was right. _‘I need to eat.’_ He growled now, unsure of where the sound was coming from before he understood. 

He pulled his hands away from his own gut, dropping to crawl a few steps forward. A scent wafted along with the smell of smoke nearby, and it was so delicious. He turned his head to find it before realizing it was coming from the camp. He shook his head violently now, having enough sense to himself to know that he couldn’t _do that._ He couldn’t do what his instincts were aching for him to do, but the craving for the iron that wafted just beneath the surface of skin was trying to overpower him and it was rapidly succeeding in the endeavor. 

Sharky made himself stand on shaky legs before he turned quickly away from that temptation to make himself run in the opposite direction of his allies. He didn’t trust himself, didn’t know how to overpower the feelings inside of him bursting through his veins now with each pump of his heart. With every inch of distance placed between him and his friends, an ache began to take hold of his muscles until he felt like he’d taken a step back in his mind. He felt like he was watching through his own eyes as he lifted his head to sniff along the breeze for prey like a wild predator looking for a kill. 

A growl trickled from his own throat as the world turned red around him, the sound of his pulse rushing through his ears like he was underwater. He scanned the edges of the trees as he kept moving before locking onto the scent of something moving in the bushes before him. He crouched like a feral beast, trying to fight his muscles as he creeped through the underbrush of the forest. His head was pounding as the source of the crunching of leaves that echoed through his ears past his heartbeat stepped out. The doe stepped out and locked eyes with him, before a snarl snapped from his chest. It stiffened up before bolting, and he found himself chasing it and moving faster than humans were supposed to. 

He wasn’t fast enough though, hissing as he leaped forward in an animalistic fashion and missing by a fraction of an inch. He crashed to the ground, rolling quickly back to his feet before he was back up and running. He could feel cuts and scrapes along his arms and he gave a sort of roar of anguished anger. The creature unfortunate enough to wander back into these trees was inches from him again, its hooves pounding with dulled sounds across the debris of the forest littering the ground in front of him. With another leap he made it to his target now, tumbling with the animal as he dug his nails in and bared his teeth again. He had a flash of a thought— _‘God, no, don’t’_ —before he lunged towards it throat and ripped it open. The warm liquid pouring down his throat did little to sate the thirst he had developed under Jacob’s gaze, but the copper taste that settled across every surface of his mouth satisfied something crawling around inside him.

He ripped into the carcass beneath him with a renewed vigor that twisted at his insides. His head started to pound and he swayed softly before he felt his hands tearing away fur and through flesh, snapping bones with a strength he didn’t know he was capable of until he clasped a warm lump in his hand. He jerked on it, pulling until the ligaments gave way and he yanked it out to pull it up to his lips. Blood poured from it, washing over his wrists and down his arms. The heat in his veins flooded forth, burning it away as steam rose up from his own flesh. He pressed the fragile flesh to his lips before he opened his mouth, and ate it with eager and ravenous motions. His stomach churned as he swallowed but he couldn’t stop until it was gone and he immediately felt hollow again.

He lifted his head when he heard a howl nearby, eyes scanning the fading swirling maroons and burgundies of the world surrounding him. A snarl rose from him again, as whatever possessed him right now tore even more control away from his own self. He leaned forward, claiming his kill as his guts twisted around themselves with ferocity. A single—somehow familiar silhouette—stepped forward, phasing through the trees. Its branching horns swayed back and forth as it stalked closer to him, and he registered the burning blue breaking through the bloody filter over his perception. The contrast made him focus and he felt himself backing up as the large demon settled in a crouch across from the animal’s body. 

_“The ache in your being is delicious…just let nature take its course…”_ He didn’t hear the words so much as know they were whispered between his brain and his skull, settling into his nerves in an attempt to rewrite his muscle memory with a buzzing intensity. He growled despite himself, pulling his lips back in an inhuman motion as he turned with the other to stand and walk away from his kill and further into the trees. He felt safer with this other creature, his pack mate, as he raced through the trees following along after the next scent. 

Fire hissed as it burned from beneath his skin, leaving charred tracks in the earth beneath him as he moved along. He tried to scream but only managed a guttural sound that had the other hunter chuckling from its throat. He darted his eyes along, trying to bring his body back into control. Right as the shock caught up to him and he blacked out, he caught a glimpse of a pair of wolves carved from stone racing at their sides—and something told him they were his true allies here, the thing he needed to search for. The creature didn’t seem to notice them as it loped along on just a few inches ahead of him with every step. And then his vision faded into black.

He fell into a dark expanse void of thoughts, like a night sky without stars. Occasionally, flashes of images flittered across it as if it were a large theater screen. Bones, blood, flesh being torn and shredded—all of it red, so red. He could feel that aching hollowness in him starting to fade as he felt his muscles weaken and his energy draining away from him despite the iron on his breath and the copper on his tongue. Suddenly a cold burn wrapped around his right wrist, and he howled in pain at the new sensation. He grasped at it with his other hand as he floated in this weightless world before the same blistering cold rippled around in a spiral from that palm. He whimpered at the pain before more words were whispered softly against his skin. 

_“Charlemagne…Sharky come back…where are you?”_ It wasn’t that same buzzing voice, but it was familiar…why was it familiar? And where _was_ he? The voice had a good question and he lacked an answer. Not that his thoughts could keep up as his inner heat ebbed away. _“Come back to me. Follow my voice, please just listen this once.”_ The soft pleading tone made him frown. He wanted to listen, he didn’t know how to make himself move when he had nothing to push off from. _“Don’t you dare let him take you from me. Don’t you dare…”_ His heart ached now at those saddening words and he felt his fire sparking back up. Well, that was it—he couldn’t disappoint the voice. Not with how much it hurt, he had to help them. 

He reached for it slowly, his energy returning as he swam lazily through the air as it thickened around him into an ooze. A light started to form and he kept pushing his way through the thick darkness. He reached and reached before he broke the seal holding him down and that light flooded down and over him, blinding him for just a second as the fire flooded over him and the world came crashing back bright and barren. He blinked slowly, all of his muscles screaming in protest as he took in a sharp breath and stared up at the branches above him. He could barely catch glimpses of the blue sky through the thick gnarled bows bending above him.

“What the fuck happened?” He mumbled to himself before his stomach churned violently, and rolled over quickly as he felt himself heaving. Chunks of meat tumbled down his esophagus and blood flooded from his mouth, and when he finished emptying everything he’d consumed in his fit of hysteria he could feel the thick blood sliding down his chin before it trailed down the front of him. He dropped back onto his ass as he groaned lowly. “Right, yeah…I remember now.” He grumbled the words as he used his jacket sleeve to wipe the blood from his mouth. 

It was then that the daylight surrounding him registered, as well as how thick the trees were. He was almost in the heart of the Whitetails, so close to the base of that towering mountain. He knew he had to get to the top of it eventually. He had to find those stone wolves, had to…help them? Destroy them? He wasn’t sure which. His tried to stand up on wobbly legs before those brands of his seared back to life and he clenched his hands tightly. “Fuck, what the fuck?!”

 _“Where are you? Sharky, for the love of anything where are you?”_ John’s voiced echoed though his mind, and he remembered the voice from the void calling him back home. _‘That was him? He sounded so helpless…he was that worried? Why?’_ He looked around him now as the taste of old pennies settled in his mouth and the scent of old blood slammed into his senses. He knew why the moment he laid eyes on the remains of wildlife circling him, and his stomach threatened to empty itself of the bile that remained in it. Bones and sinew barely clinging to one another, antlers and feathers and fur scattered the ground around the bloody mess around him like a summoning circle.

He remembered John was talking to him and me made himself focus again. “I’m here. I don’t know where here is, but I’m here.” He spoke quietly out loud, before he pushed himself off the ground and spun around. His joints moaned in protest beneath his skin as he felt a sudden pull in a direction and he began walking towards it. It wasn’t long before he heard the voice in his head once more.

 _“Oh thank God…you’re safe…”_ It felt like soothing coolness washing over his frayed nerves as he walked along. He kept trying to decipher the meaning of the pair of wolves as he kept going. He felt himself speeding up despite how much it hurt him, eager to get back to his own demon while he pondered his own humanity and how much of it he may have lost the night before. He was in such a primal state it was almost a bizarre concept, and along the trail back he looked down to notice those charred foot prints he’d left behind the night before were leading him back the way he’d come.

As he reached the end of them, he saw something moving through the trees toward him very quickly. He felt himself stiffened up in anticipation before a feeling of protectiveness washed over him and he was moving forward to meet John as the demon— _his demon_ —rushed for him. He reached out to the other as he threw his arms around his neck and clung to him tightly. He wrapped his arms around him, doing his best to try and soothe him however he could. His arms slipped around his waist and he breathed in his scent of soot, burning campfires, and autumn evenings. 

“Hey now, hey now, what’s all this? I might think you care about me.” He was whispering the words against the side of the other’s head, trying his best to dodge the horns curving back behind him like thin, neat little knives arching perfectly over his slicked back hair. The demon was quivering in his arms before he finally hissed low words against his skin.

“Because I do. You left Sharky, you left and I got scared. I thought he took you away from me.” The sudden confession stung a little and he wasn’t sure why. Did he disappoint him? _‘Am I just another let down? God, why do I always do this?’_

“No, man. You brought me back.” He whispered the words softly, giving his own confession in return once more. The other stilled suddenly beneath his hands, pulling back just enough to take him in as he spoke. “Besides, I thought I said I’d never leave you? If I didn’t, I meant to.” He could feel himself blushing as he ducked his gaze briefly.

“Did I?” John’s question was genuine in its confusion. “Why’s that? Why would you follow me?”

“Because I care too, you idiot.” He laughed because he thought it was obvious. He’d been trying to hide any confusing emotions but by no means did he think he was any good at it. The other scanned his face with frosted blue eyes, searching for some kind of trick he lacked behind his words. He just smiled hesitantly in response before John blinked a couple of times before a soft gasp slipped from him before he could stop it.

“…huh.” It was brief but it made him smile a bit in response before the other finished his thought finally. “That’s not…I wasn’t expecting that.” He could stop the soft breath of a laugh as he grinned a bit.

“No, of course not. You can’t see yourself or the light in you,” He was trying to be encouraging and worrying he would come off as teasing instead, but he kept trying. “The same one that pulled me from that abyss I was fucking trapped in. So thank you, shorty.” He grinned again before the other released a breath of air and whispered to him quietly.

“Ride or die, I believe you said?” 

“Ride or die, that’s right.” He confirmed, nodding vigorously before the motion set his head to swimming. The other returned the grin, eyes dropping briefly to observe him in some newfound light he’d discovered.

“Could I…would you mind if I tried something?” John’s voice was so quiet he almost missed it, as he hands finally released from behind his neck to grasp at the edges of his hood.

“Yeah man, go for it.” He gave his permission without hesitation, humming in quiet thought before he was given some instructions.

“Just uh…just close your eyes.” It was out of left field but he laughed and nodded, closing his eyes quickly.

“Yeah, alright. I guess I can do that.” He kept talking even though all he could see was the insides of his own eyelids. But before he could keep going he felt something pressed softly against his lips. Before he could freak out, his eyes flew open to see the other was kissing him. His eyelids dropped closed again and he tugged John closer against him, tightening his arms around him as he kissed him back. 

For a moment, the world stopped moving around them as he got lost in the cool sensation against his own feverish lips as he deepened the kiss. He felt the other’s hands slip up and into the back of his hair, freely tugging at it—which met he’d lost his cap at some point in the night but he could care less at this point. They broke apart and he took deep ragged breaths before he rested his forehead against John’s before giving a breathy sort of laugh. “Whoa.”

“Yeah…I have to agree.” John whispered back, before they heard clapping just behind them and they jumped apart quickly.

“That’s cute and all, but what the fuck happened to you?” Eli stood there, rifle swung around behind him as he just smiled knowingly between the two of them. “You’re covered in almost a whole deer there.”

He took a moment to really look himself over now. The front of his sweatshirt was caked with blood and fur, and a quick glance to John showed him the blood around his mouth had been transferred as well. His hands were stained a dark maroon, and his nails seemed sharper than they had the night before. He’d be scrubbing blood and dirt out from under them for months. “A demon happened to me.”

“Makes sense in these trying times. Let’s get you cleaned up and fed. Bet you need some good rest too, along with cleaning any wounds.” Eli responded, moving over to them to escort them back to the camp. “Everything’s packed up and ready to go. Hope you learned something.”

“Yes to all of that but the food and the wounds. Not hungry, and none of this blood is mine.” He admitted, turning to follow the other human as John floated behind him closely. He held a hand out in offering as they walked, smiling when he felt the other slip his fingers between his. _‘Whatever this is, it’s a fucking miracle. I can’t fuck this up, even if its nothing right now.’_

 _“It’s not nothing, but I’m not sure what the something is.”_ The thoughts echoed through his head reassuringly, before he grinned at the other to give him a silent message of appreciation. He didn’t know if it was something that would last, or just a desperate bond both of them needed to get through this. But nevertheless, it mattered to him more than anything else could in this single moment. _‘An anchor to reality, something to grasp at when I feel like I’m drowning. Who’da ever thought it’d be him?’_


	10. Suffering From the Wrong Defense

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A witch in the woods and an encounter that shakes John to his very core.

They had rested up and gotten Sharky cleaned and hydrated. But despite what he’d gone through the night before, he was insisting they go hunt _something_ and muttering about progress. So they were in the truck once more, heading back to the Henbane after the human had radioed his cousin for the witch’s location. He received a bare minimum, yet drawn out answer from the rambling voice about how to get to her home. They could take the vehicle to a certain point, but they’d have to walk the rest of the way. Through Faith’s bliss and whatever she’d stirred up with her magic. John was not excited in the slightest, but they needed another ally. Even if he was still prepared to fight her—witches were a bane to demons, after all. And he’d do anything to push off discussing that kiss. _‘What was I thinking? Why did I do that? Why did he return it, what does that even mean here?’_

He was getting used to driving with the amount they had been doing, but he was still thankful to slip from the cab and back onto the soggy ground. The grass glistened with moisture as the sun tried to break through the thin mist coiling out of the trees. He shivered as he stared into the woods, some kind of dread creeping up his spine as he heard a wailing cry slipping along the breeze towards them. “She’s stirred up every inch of that forest…”

“The animals were calm.” Sharky’s voice from his side made the demon turn with a jerk, but their close proximity made him smile despite himself. He leaned towards the other slightly, though he could feel himself stiffening with jealousy as the words registered. “On that night, the animals were calm. So its not natural. She said they find their way to peace, and Peaches was there too, purring all chill like. I kinda wanna get her next time I go in.”

“Ignoring the fact that I’m still mad at you for that night and the implication it won’t be the last time.” And he was still upset, but not exactly for the same reasoning he was giving. He needed to stop lying, he was mad because Faith had kissed him after she’d made eye contact with him over the humans shoulder. He shook his head of the thought and focused on the last half of the other’s statement like he’d meant to. “Who is Peaches and why must we retrieve her?”

“She’s a kitten, alright? Just a _really_ big one. And I mean…why not? Make a badass pet. I’ll pet her and feed her, make sure she gets exercise. I’ll love her forever, well until I have to return her to Miss Mabel. Mean old bitch ruins everything.” He hadn’t expected to watch the other light up as much as he did at the concept he’d started covering, only to watch him droop to sulk by the end of it.

He cocked an eyebrow at that. “A cat?” Was he missing something? Would this cat help somehow?

“A _really big cat._ ” Sharky insisted again, hovering his hand up a little below waist level. “She could stand up and hug me right around the neck. It’d be fucking cute too, as long as you got food for her.” He was grinning from ear to ear, and he suddenly didn’t want to disappoint him by saying the thought was vaguely terrifying.

Instead, he held his own hands up in resignation as he admitted a single thing. “That does not ease my nerves in the slightest.” The other laughed quietly as he snapped his fingers before catching the cane that dropped from the puff of smoke that was his personal void.

“Well moving on, what do you think it is?” Sharky asked as he watched him, and he felt a flash of pride welling up in him at the he captured his attention the way he did.

“Could be ghosts, could be a banshee. It could be one of her _Angels_ having a moment of consciousness.” John waved his cane about as he hummed in mock consideration. He knew what it was—that time it had been Faith as she truly was.

“Now see, that’s spooky.” For a moment he thought the other had read _his_ mind this time, but he had a feeling he hadn’t figured out how to do that quite yet. Not with something so subtle. He offered a small smirk instead, shrugging his shoulders in an exaggerated expression.

“Her Angels, yes. The rest mostly want to just exist. But they are upset. They don’t take change well, and a power shift is a big one. Some of the creatures are using it to feed and cause chaos as they please, I’m sure. But quite a bit of the Unseen merely wish to exist. That’s it, and who can fault them tor the most basic instinct we all have?” He hummed thoughtfully, ever neutral in this quest and with his own basic want. “So we should be careful what we face off against. No need to jump into fights we don’t need to have. And some we may have to help because its always good to have numbers on our side.”

His human nodded slowly before he spoke in a solemn sense of wisdom. “Alright, makes sense. There’s good things in the world, and there’s bad things. And then there’s unlucky fucks like me that just want to keep doing what I’m doing, but instead they gotta save the world.” He slowly moved over until he felt Sharky pulling him back in against the warmth of his chest. “Might as well help as much as I can, right?” He could feel the other wrap his arms around his waist, his own cool fingers dropping to trail along them as his insides squirmed. _‘You shouldn’t be touching me like this, I’m tainted. I’ve already corrupted you…but I crave you. Disgusting.’_ He clung to the gesture though before he finally, and regrettably, pulled himself away to motion to the truck.

“I couldn’t have said it better.” He offered up a smile to Sharky before nodding to the truck behind him. “Let’s go then. Grab your gear.” He did hover to make sure the other got it all. Even if they didn’t get swept up in the green haze, they could run into anything. He made sure the human had the holy water in his hand, ready to use. His shotgun was slung over his shoulder before he returned over to his side. He reached for his hand but John found himself dancing away like a frightened deer in the spring, twitterpated and aggravated by the fact of it alone. _‘I don’t deserve that.’_ Instead he led the other on and into the woods. He stayed close still, trying his best to make sure they didn’t get separated.

They stayed in a long silence as they moved, pricks of soft light floating closer to them before Sharky finally spoke. “Do you…want to talk about the uh…what happened?” Dread filled him as he blanched. _‘Oh God, no. No I do not. I can’t have that, I’m not worthy.’_ He cleared his throat after a minute, before the other kept talking. “Cause I mean…I’d like to talk about…the thing that happened.” John swallowed around the lump of embarrassment forming in his throat. “See, I’m real confused. Cause it seemed like, you know…we clicked. And I’m not gonna lie, I really like…you. You get me, or at least it sure feels like you do and we’re already ride or die right?” With every struggling word he wished to sink further inside of himself to avoid the conversation he knew they would have to have. 

“Yes.” John answered as he took a moment to glance at him, earning a beaming smile from the other and they fell into silence again as they walked through the low lying fog. The fog thickened and dampened the ground beneath them more which helped to smother their footsteps more until he couldn’t hear the other walking close to him anymore. He started to worry the other was pulled into the fog when he could see a form walking closer to him. A hand reached out, and he recognized Sharky as he stepped forward as he took his hand this time. Green twisted into the white surrounding them, and he smiled until Sharky pulled him close. _‘Oh no. No no no, not again, not so soon.’_ He hissed a bit as he pulled away, surprised when the human caught his wrist quickly and tugged him forward again.

“Come on, John. Just one more time?” Sharky asked, and the tone needled at his senses. He wasn’t sure what to do with the feeling trying to force its way into him but he pulled himself forcefully from his grasp. “What happened John?”

“I don’t know what happened, but it happened—that kiss happened, I need to admit that—and I did really enjoy myself but its just…its too much—too much right now.” He started rambling, in the same way the other did earlier at the start of their walk. “I want you. Fuck, I want you. But I can’t.” He was backtracking as he watched his face fall more with each word. He stepped forward again, reaching for him in an attempt to fix this when the other pulled away from him this time.

“Why?” His human’s voice waivered and his heart felt like it was shattering in his chest. “Is there something wrong with me?”

“Of course not. You’re…much more incredible than I want to admit even to myself. Because then you’ll make me weak. We can’t afford to be weak, Charlemagne—not yet.” He was spilling honesty from his lips quicker than he’d ever meant to, and he was brushing his fingers along the other’s cheeks when he finally let him get close enough again.

“Why not?” Sharky was so quiet and somber, he almost lost his words to the mist. “Why can’t we just be together?” His insides twisted again before he frowned as the sparkling lights surrounding them finally caught his attention.

“Why are you pushing this?” John mused, growling lowly as the obvious answer peaked into his brain. “This isn’t like you, this—that’s because this is someone else.” The imposter softened his expression before giggling filled the air surrounding them and his form dissipated into green mist that rolled down around his feet and rising into his face. “Show yourself Faith.”

“It took you longer to catch on than I thought it would. That’s disappointing.” Faith crooned from the trees, stepping out of the mist above him to flutter down on those glimmering gossamer wings of hers.

“What’s disappointing is your continued use of glamour. You’re a demon, not one of the Fair Folk. Act like it.” He challenged back as he summoned his cane back to his hand, pointing the orb at the end towards her with his own promise of a threat. “What have you done with him? If you hurt him—” 

Her giggling interrupted him once more as she twisted toward him, twirling along in her own breeze. Then she pursed her lips in a soft pout, swaying her hands behind her back in a gesture of faux innocence. “Oh Johnny, he’s safe.” Her voice was melodic on the soft wind, her grin splitting her face unnaturally as she finally landed on her feet silently. “Of course I’d keep him safe. He’s my favorite play thing, after all.” As she paused to hum thoughtfully, he heard a shout from further in the trees. “But I have a feeling he might not like you quite as much after this.”

“You’re not really here, are you?” He felt side swiped as the realization kicked in. once more. _‘This is yet another illusion.’_

She laughed again, lifting her fingers to her mouth in a feigned attempt at hiding it. “Of course not. Where did you get the idea that I think you’re important enough?”

“Careful now. You’re starting to sound like your father.” He snarled out the words as he swung his cane forward through her misty form. It floated away on the breeze, carried away into the rest of the glittering woods. 

“I wonder why that is?” Her voiced echoed around him and in his mind at the same time as Sharky’s shout for help caught his attention and he crashed through the woods in an attempt to reach him. “Enjoy this dream of yours, dear brother John. It’ll be a nightmare before long.” The promise seeped into his bones and he hurried towards the other’s increasing screams now. He clenched his fist around the cane in his hand, summoning his human and hoping for an answer.

He broke through the fog into a clearing by the river, where he found Sharky struggling against something he couldn’t make out on the shore. He closed the distance to find an otter like creature latched onto his chest, and its tail bore a hand at the end of it that was trying desperately to wrap itself around his throat. John gave a loud roar of his own as he spun the cane around to twist the middle of it. He pulled it apart to reveal the thin blades hidden within it as he charged forward. He pooled his fire into his hands until it bled out and up the blades, and then he swung at the beast.

It howled in pain as it jerked away from the human to focus on the new challenger, snarling before it leapt towards him. He spun one of the blades around for it to impale itself for him, but a blast of fire rocketed it away from the both of them and he turned to look at Sharky once more. The human panted heavily as he caught his breath, scratches and deep claw marks littering his arms and his chest—all of which had blood that was steaming away against the other’s fresh magma veins. “I called for you. I called and you just kept walking.”

“That wasn’t me. That wasn’t me, I’d never walk away from you.” John was promising both of them as he knelt down in an attempt to look at his wounds. He flinched away a bit and he felt wounded that the other was so upset. _‘What did she do to you?’_ He wracked his mind for a way to snap him out of whatever dream she was trying to trap them both in, and in a frantic effort he grabbed the other by the front of his sweatshirt and pulled him into a deep kiss once more. He poured every bit of those fluttering feelings in his chest into the gesture until he felt the other relaxing a bit before he was returning the gesture in earnest. He broke away to stare into those blue grey eyes as he made another promise. “I’m here, I’ve got you. I’ll never let you go.”

“You’re here…you promise?” His voice was so hesitant that he knew he was telling the truth as he nodded along.

“I promise.” He whispered as he leaned in to kiss him again, softly this time. The other relaxed against him as he pulled away again. And then shortly after his eyes dropped shut and he fell forward against him. He lowered him to the ground, looking around them to figure out where they were. They were close to the witch’s cabin, they had to be. He reassembled his cane, dropped it back into the void, and moved to lift the other up to carry him in his arms along the path while it was still clear.

It wasn’t long before the fog was trying to swallow them up again, but he focused his energy into keeping them shrouded with defensive spells. He could see a wall of some sort up ahead, another clearing opening up before them on the trail. He ran towards it, grinning in triumph as he saw the small cabin through the thinning fog. But as he reached it, he felt his body slam to a halt against it and he dropped the human he’d been carrying to gasp loudly in pain as light seared his skin. _‘What the fuck is this?’_

“Right on time, it would seem.” A voice broke through the pain in every inch of his being, and he growled loudly in defense despite being incapable of moving.

“Who’s there?!” His words were desperate as he listened carefully.

“I’m the witch you’re looking for.” Relief flooded through him at the lower, raspier musical voice answered him. She stepped closer and the fog pushed back away from her as she jingled with jostling charms and trinkets tied to bells. 

“Of course. See, everything makes sense now.” John laughed quietly, eyes darting across her to take in her features. Brown hair with golden highlights like sunlight weaved through the wavy locks that parted around her as she knelt down to look at Sharky as she seemed to ignore him. She reached tattooed hands forward, the flowers on her arms almost swaying as she lifted one of his arm’s up to trace her finger tips down those lava veins that were now pulsating. She shifted the arm again to look at the scratches along his arms, tsking quietly before she rested his arm back down to head towards where she came from and leaving him in the fog. “Well not entirely. What the Hell do you think you’re doing?” He heard something being dragged across the ground towards them once more. The air cleared again as she settled a stretcher down on the ground beside the human, before she circled around and braced herself to heft him halfway onto the handcrafted tool. “Where are you trying to take him?” He was growling again before releasing a hiss of pain as the light burned further into his skin.

“I’m taking him in to tend to his wounds.” Her tone was curt as she glanced up at him, her expression giving nothing away to him. Like he could trust that, like he could trust _any of this._

“You have to let me come too. I can’t leave him again.” He was trying to push at those forces with his mind, trying to fight against these invisible forces holding him in place here at the border of this witch’s wards. He snarled once again as bands formed around his limbs, wrapping around him and tightening like sentient ribbons. 

“I’m not the one stopping you. You are.” Her tone was so matter of fact it stopped his attempts at flailing about and sent him into a momentary stupor of stunned silence.

“What?” The word was whispered softly, and she merely nodded towards him with the slightest smile spread across her lips.

“My wards aren’t for anything in particular. Only to keep out those who mean me even the slightest harm.” She shrugged a bit, and he felt the rage welling up again. 

“I don’t mean you harm though! You’re lying!” His rage blossomed in the flames that rose up along his arms before those ribbons of soft yellow light glowed threateningly before snuffing them back out.

“Seems you’re the one lying.” She answered, before she turned her attention back to Sharky. She moved down to heft him the rest of the way up onto the stretcher, standing back up to dust her hands off and arch her back in an attempt to stretch it back out before she turned to look at him once more. “If you truly meant me well, you could move easily.” She floated back around to the head of the device as a soft groan escaped the unconscious form laid out on the woven branches.

“If you take him from me, I swear I’ll—” He was growling and tensing back up, and he slammed back into silence as the tone of his own words registered. He sighed, trying to get those bristling nerves to calm back down. “Okay, yes, I can see what you mean.”

“Relax. I am not your enemy here, demon.” She moved back around to stand inches from his reach, before a soft laugh escaped her. “A phrase I never thought I’d say.”

“I just found him and I cannot leave his side.” He ignored her statement in favor of explaining himself, before he found himself pleading now. “Please…please don’t take him.”

“I’m not taking him to hurt you. Look at me with your true sight, creature.” She prompted him, holding her arms open at her sides to show her empty hands. “I merely wish to heal him. He is safe here. _You_ are safe here.” He squinted briefly before he did as he was told, summoning forth his true sight. His eyes burned as he looked through the hazy greys they cast the world in, and as he took her in she glowed in the soft greens and pinks of Spring gods with a singular twisting strand of black from something death based that had blessed her. More importantly, her edges were smooth—there was no reverberating edges of lies twitching at the edges of her being.

“Yes…yes, that’s the truth.” He closed his eyes, blinking away the burning. He’d rub at them, but he still couldn’t quite lift his hands. He opened them again to nod at her now. “Take him and hurry.”

“Good man. I’ll see you soon. Come on in when you get through.” She smiled before moving around to the front of the stretcher. She braced herself, before she bent over to lift of the handles and begin slowly dragging the bending boughs towards the cabin. 

“Are you always mystical?” It was his turn to laugh as a shaky breath left his charred lungs aching, suddenly relishing the momentary feeling of breathing. 

She shook her head as she pulled Sharky further from his sight, calling back to him as the fog closed around him again. “No actually, I’m quite clear. If you can’t understand, then you’re not listening.”

“Yes, of course that’s what you would say.” He huffed, closing his eyes and focusing on calming back down. 

It took a long moment before he convinced his muscles to unwind and release the tension that had made them coil up in the constant state of defense he’d found himself in these days. He forced his eyes open to look around him, telling himself to accept the help and the safety offered to him, to not lash out. _‘If not for anything else, then do it so you can get back to his side.’_ He took a deep, unnecessary breath and released it slowly. After a few minutes, the tightening yellow ribbons slowly released him, slipping off his limbs to pool around his feet before slowly slithering back into the earth.

The first thing he did was try lifting his hands, relieved to find the movement sluggish but possible. He rubbed at his eyes, hissing softly at the cooling feeling of his own touch before pulling back to flex his fingers now. He looked forward, to the cabin, and took a few shaky steps through the wards and onto the protected land. The moment he was through, the fog cleared away and around the small wooden building was a dome of clear air—the thick mists curling and twisting like smoke under glass, trying to penetrate a surface that it had no hope of touching. Around the cabin was a collection of various plants, little stakes with tags of scrawling text indicating different types planted neatly in the ground next to each one. He’d run to the cabin but he couldn’t manage more than a rushed stumble of a pace, summoning his cane to use for balance for once. 

A loud groan pulled his eyes back forward, to the small path leading to the steps before the door, and he found strength returning to him quickly as he felt the urge to run forward again. He tripped up the three little steps up, catching himself in the frame of the open door to find Sharky spread out across a table in the center of the room. Said table had clearly been pulled there recently, jars and books of all kinds scattered on the floor around it and the other’s hoodie removed from him. Green salves thick with the scents of various herbs were spread across wounds, cloudy pink gemstones placed around his form. The witch was circling the table, a bowl of burning incense with billowing white smoke pouring from it that she was pushing towards him in little circular motions with a bundle of feathers. She chanted soft words he couldn’t quite make out, but he supposed that was the point of it all. This was a magic he didn’t understand, but with the natural wards across the county raised it was clearly elevated.

Before he could speak, she had moved around to the other side of the human and looked up to him. “Glad to see you’ve joined us. I’m just guessing here, but I suppose you’re John. He’s been whispering your name. And seeing as how you’re…tied to him, if you will, I’m sure your presence will help with the spell. The stronger it is, the faster he heals. Now come here and take his hand. Either one is fine, though I imagine the branded one will be a stronger link.” Her posture and her tone indicated she knew more than she was acknowledging, but the way she had traced the veins of the other’s magic so clearly earlier already told him she knew the truth. He chose not to question it, and instead moved around to take her place and lift the unconscious man’s hand up in his own. He pressed that raised brand along his warm palm against the cool one of his own hand, slowly lowering himself to his knees to rest beside him.

Upon a tiny shred of a whim, he lifted the other’s knuckles to place a soft kiss to the rough skin there. The warmth against his freezing lips made him smile despite the current circumstances. _‘Sharky…come back. This is the second time in so few hours that I’m begging you to come back.’_ He leaned his forehead down to rest against his wrist and the pulse fluttering beneath his skin. He startled a little when he felt a feather light touch upon his shoulder, jerking his eyes open and to the side of him where the witch was standing in silent solidarity of support. He wasn’t sure how to react to the gesture, merely turning his gaze back to Sharky.

“You care for him quite a bit.” Her words reverberated through his bones, and he flinched a bit at the thought that followed. _‘Is it that obvious? Of course it is. How much of our conversation was real? Did he trail off in the middle of it…or before it even started?’_ She pulled her hand away from him to pat his shoulder before moving to kneel beside him. He glanced over, finding a strand of black knotted hemp with red beads wrapped around her hand as she tucked her legs beneath her in her own position of prayer. “I’m almost shocked to see a demon so invested in a living being…though if he keeps using his newfound magic from that pact…he won’t be living for very long, will he?”

Her words cut him deep, but this time he kept himself from reacting to them. Until he heard his desperate whisper with his own ears, and he ducked his head at his own weakness. “I had to…I had to make the offer of the deal, or he’d never have survived. No one would have.” That was true—if no one knew what was coming, everything would have been lost. They’d become too powerful in their death, and no one was praying for them to leave existence this time. No, they had been long forgotten by the people that lived here. _‘What would Jacob think of me now? I miss how he was, how they all were…’_

“I understand. Cruel things were released that night.” She didn’t seem like she was judging him, and when he stole another glance he saw her eyes were closed and her head was bowed.

“You know about the wards being lifted.” He already knew the answer, there was no use being dumbfounded. She knew more than she was going to admit until she’d been told to admit it. _‘Who are your Gods, little witch?’_

“Know about them? I saw them!” There was a soft gasp at the memory he’d apparently brought back to her senses. He could feel her own energy curling off of her, some of the sigils etched into her skin glowing more with each second. “And I felt them—like something ripping through my veins and thundering in my chest, yet no wound was left in its wake. It looked like colors rippling across the night sky, a kaleidoscope of colors that should have been beautiful but the jagged edges and the dark colors running through them tainted that. But yes, I do know.”

“They want to destroy everything.” He confessed what she probably knew, but they hadn’t told another living being besides Eli—and he still didn’t know he wasn’t human either. It was freeing in a way, someone knowing the whole truth.

“Yes. They never enjoyed living—the wouldn’t appreciate life now.” She opened her eyes to look at him, green gaze like soft gilded blades of grass. He smiled hesitantly as she graced him with her own grief she must feel buzzing from him. _‘An empath.’_ He’d never really grieved the loss of what they could have been, and here was a moment he could. She was asking him a question with her gaze, and after a long silence he nodded ever so slightly. _‘They were my family, and at one point I loved them.’_

“John. My name is John Seed.” The introduction was unnecessary but a formal one. The gift of his true name, a thank you for what she was doing for Sharky—gratitude for accepting his secret without violence. She simply smiled in response.

“I know. I’m Calista Greene. Feel free to call me Callie.” She paused a long moment as she returned her own name in response, the full one. She was gifting him with trust not to use the power that held against her, and he knew already that he wouldn’t. But her next words were like a knife to the side, still not sure what to do in return for them. “Its what my friends call me.” They were friends…now he had two.

“You are an odd witch.” He smiled around the words, and she laughed quietly in response but didn’t deny them.

“And you are an odd demon. But I have a feeling in another life, we would have made quite the team.” She stood up again, uncurling like a sprig of ivy in the sun. 

“For some reason…I believe that.” And he did. He had some kind of niggling sensation that in another life, one where they both existed at the same time, that they were close. Some small connection that had let him tell her the truth. And he was thankful for it, almost overwhelmed with the compassion she offered him. And he could tell she knew it, he understood she had felt it too because she was the first to say anything.

But that didn’t soften the final blow given, another discussion that needed to happen but hadn’t yet. “Now…how about some tea? I’ll bring you a cup, and you can tell me how long he has left as a human.” That was going to take a long time. But right now, they needed to pass enough time for the other to heal. But he wouldn’t leave the other’s side; instead he just nodded, waiting for her to return so he could further unburden himself of the lies he’d been telling for centuries.


	11. What Do You Want With a Devil Like Me?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Is he seeing a different side of her? Is this side real? More importantly...what defines what's real anymore, when in only a few days everything's considered reality has been slowly pulled away from him to be replaced with a new truth. Either way, he can't lie about how he feels.

Sharky sat up and looked around his surroundings, but he immediately realized something was wrong. After the shit in the mist, he should have hurt like nobody’s business—and yet, nothing. He turned to his left, where he found John crouched down beside him with his head resting on… _’Wait a minute. Am I on a fucking table? What the fuck happened?’_ The demon stirred beside him, and he saw he was holding something…focusing hard on the gently twisting vision of the world around him, he saw his own arm out with John’s fingers twisted through his own. _‘Holy shit, he’s holding my hand.’_ He grabbed at his chest before it clicked in. _‘Wait, I’m holding me…what the fuck?!’_

He jerked back, pulling out of himself and floating in the air. “Am I dead?” He twisted around to see a woman moving over to his body on the table, trinkets and charms dangling from her hands as she chanted in words unspoken. He could see a subtle glowing around the edges of his being, that same soft green energy John had showed him before. He moved around to the demon’s side, resting a hand on his shoulder that the other didn’t react to. _‘I said I wouldn’t leave you.’_

“No. You’re only asleep.” A soft, sweet voice traced through the air, and he looked up towards the open door. A familiar form swayed softly as she floated in the air, her singsong voice pushing at the edges of his mind and twisting at his heart. “The witch’s wards keep out my physical form, but she can’t stop the dreams. Especially not yours.” 

_“Faith.”_ He whispered her name again, and she gave him a soft smile in return. She held out her hands, almost as if summoning him closer. Against his better judgement, he moved closer to her, his own smile flitting across his face.

“Sharky…” He loved the way she said his name, and he found himself reaching to take her outstretched hands. She laced her fingers with his happily, swishing their arms like gentle pendulums before she asked him a tempting question. “Come dance with me.”

He almost followed her before he glanced behind him to the other two beings hovering around him. “But I gotta…” She tugged him softly towards the door, shaking her head softly at his protests. 

“You can’t hear anything they’re saying. You’re in a different realm.” That made sense he supposed, and spending time with her while his body was resting sounded like a good idea. She continued to speaking with that musical tone of hers that pulled his attention so easily. “But you can hear me…and I have some things I need to tell you while He can’t hear me.” Her tone dipped into something darker, something more serious. The part of him that still believed she was good tugged at him, but he tilted his head in a bit of confusion. 

“Wait, who can’t hear you?” He felt like he knew who she meant, and a brief flash of fear passed through her eyes as she shook her head.

“I can’t say his name or I’ll summon him.” He felt honesty in her answer, before she lifted a hand to press feather soft digits against his cheek and he leaned into it without a second thought. “And I want you to myself right now. I’m a little selfish.”

“Oh…why would you tell me anything you don’t want…Him knowing?” The question was serious, but she simply smiled in response to it and he felt himself relaxing again.

“Just come dance with me.” She repeated her suggestion, before he finally nodded and gave in. 

“Yeah…okay. Lead the way.” As soon as he relented, she started to lead him out back into the woods. 

“Thank you.” She whispered before he realized they were floating along through the air before passing through the barrier around the cabin and into the soft green misty world she controlled outside of it. He kept a grip on her hand as they slipped in and out and around trees, feeling a tune passing through her and into him until he began to hum it. They broke free into a new little glade, and she spun around to rest her arms on his shoulders. He let his hands hover at her waist before they finally settled in place. She was letting him lead as they rocked from side to side inches from the ground. “You are so sweet, so blessed. If anyone could do any good against us, its you. Find my heart. Find my totem and crush it. And when He comes for you…don’t listen.”

He looked into her blue eyes with those silver winds twisting through them. She seemed so still, as if he was dancing with a still lake. It was fluid, and natural, with electricity crackling between their strangely comforting embrace as they danced on her winds. She truly was a storm contained in a body, and it did not help to clear up his confusion at why she was even telling him any of this. “I can’t figure out what your deal is.” 

Sharky’s confession caught him off guard but all she did was quirk her head, the locks over her hair twisting away from her face and curling around the flower crown perched on her head. The vines around her arms creaked as she pulled away to twirl them softly in a circle, lacey wings of fading green mist forming on her shoulders. “What ever do you mean?”

“Are you really on my side? Are you really good?” He shrugged before he spun her out away from him, and she lifted him higher in the air before she spun back in against his chest. “What even is good nowadays? Cause I mean, you’re a demon…but I feel like you’re good. So maybe morals really are twisted up together and that greys out a lot of things.” 

Her peaceful face faded briefly as her brow creased, and her eyes fogged up in a way that reminded him she was already dead in a certain aspect. A sense of regret washed over him now—not at her expense, just in the sense that he had to meet her when she’d already become a demon. Maybe he could have stopped it. At how she was trapped in a body she seemed to want to break free of; he could see it in the curve of her smile and the way she stared just passed him as she saw the future. “I think…you think too much.”

“Seems like its paying off, right?” He joked, and she snapped back to herself like a crack of lightning. She smiled as she pulled away from him and tugged him along higher into the air until they were several feet from the ground. She settled her arms around his neck again, back into the position they had started in. He rested his hands back against her waist as they swayed softly like awkward middle schoolers dancing—chaste and modest, mostly just an excuse to be close. Her element pulled his own forward, fire pooling into his fingertips and just beneath his skin and caused steam to rise up from her skin. 

She didn’t seem to notice as she responded to him. “Hmm…it definitely plays to your advantage at being charming. I like your long metaphors I can barely keep up with sometimes, and the way you say my name. Like there’s still hope in the world.” She finally rested her head on his shoulder, and he just held her close—offering her safety and shelter from her fears. “It’s warm, but not like He is—you don’t burn. Yours is compassion, sweet and light and…home.” She sighed softly, her lips relaxing into a rare content smile.

“You know I’ve barely seen you smile?” Sharky asked her, and she tilted her head up just slightly from where she had perched it against his neck. “These moments are quiet…I kinda look forward to them. But your eyes always look so damn sad.” She reached fingers up, sliding them along his neck before brushing lightly against his goatee. He realized they were sinking now, slowly coming to a rest on their knees on the ground before they fell into each other and lowered themselves to the ground.

“I am very old. I became part of the land. It was nice…pleasant…tranquility in my storm. I just want to go back.” It felt like those vines wrapping around her tightened as they crawled along the ground and over her legs—sad attempts of forming roots that had no hope to really take hold of the ground. Any that reached for him burned and singed, the soft smell of burning wood perfuming the air between them like the remnants of a campfire. He sighed softly as he felt that feeling of sloth twitching at his senses, and he felt a flash of jealousy that she could find this kind of peace at all. But he stuffed it quickly to the back of his mind as he rested his chin on the top of her head.

“I’ll try and help you get back. Any way I can.” He had whispered the words before her could have considered stopping himself, but he knew immediately that he had meant them.

“You promise?” The question made him smile and he nodded quiet confirmation. She tilted her head and pressed a soft kiss to his neck as he responded with a low voice that he felt rumble like thunder against those delicate petals over his pulse.

“I promise.”

“You’re going to be fine, and your fire is going to go strong. It’ll burn so bright, everyone will see your true beauty.” She whispered, sliding her hands up into his hair, dragging herself tight against him as if clinging to the freshly made oath. She was offering him her own form of shelter now, as they settled into the quiet of the crickets and the birdsong of the evening. “I hope I get to see it.”

He hoped she did too. Hell, he hoped he did as well. Eventually he stood up, pulling her gently up by her hands. He could feel himself being tugged back to the cabin just as she whispered that he was waking up. She led him back to through the wards time passing oddly, as the journey through the door to his body seemed to go quicker. He found it hard to pull away from her as he was pulled away to the gentle green energy now covering his body. He was levitating above his own body as she whispered a final reminder. _“Find my heart, find it and crush it. Set me free.”_ He nodded before he was closing his eyes and falling into himself again.

When he opened his eyes again, he bolted up to look for her but Faith was gone. He felt someone clutching at his hand, and he returned the gesture and looked at John. The demon looked exhausted but relieved before he rose up from his knees to wrap his arms around his shoulders. Sharky wrapped himself around the other man quickly as the other whispered soft praises against his skin. He returned them with his own promises, before he finally shut the other up with a kiss. His hands had found the other’s hair, messing up those carefully groomed locks as he tugged him closer yet as he swallowed his affection.

They jumped apart when someone coughed behind them, and they jerked to look at the woman he’d seen in his dreams. “If you don’t mind, I don’t think now is quite the right time for this kind of gesture. For one, I’m standing right here. And for two, you’re on my table.” She smiled as she teased, and John looked more sheepish than he’d ever seen him look before. “Now take it easy, and tell me what you’ve learned. You talked with the demon in your dreams.” 

She had handed him a small wooden mug, some kind of hot tea steaming in it. He could smell honey tracing it before she dropped that on him and he sputtered around the sip he’d just taken. “How did you—”

A knowing smile crossed the witch’s lips before she shrugged, creating little musical notes as her trinkets tinkled and jingled with the gesture. “You are in my territory. I know everything that happens here.”

“Fair enough.” He took a proper sip, getting ready to settle in and explain. He needed to be honest with John, and they needed this woman on their side—he remembered that. “So…” He settled in to explain to her, listening to the wind whistling around the bubble of the cabin’s proximity like a promising whisper.


End file.
